What Happened to the Concordes?
airandspace.si.edu
These days, it takes seven hours to fly from New York to London, compared to under three hours flying at twice the speed of sound on the Concorde. When I started my internship at the National Air and Space Museum, I was determined to learn why.

Why didn’t it succeed?

Concorde flights came to a screeching halt after only 27 years of operation on October 24, 2003. The reason? Excessive cost, high fares, and loud noise. On a regular flight, Concordes consumed 6,771 gallons of fuel, which quickly exceeded the profit made from the flight. In addition to that, only a total of 20 Concordes were built and no airline ordered them except for Air France and British Airways, who had to as they were state-run airlines at the time.

Oh, and a 2000 crash that killed everyone on board (109 people) and four people on the ground.

  • ReiRose@lemmy.worldEnglish
    19·
    23 hours ago

    The crash was caused by part of the engine cowl from the previous flight (continental DC10) falling off and remaining on the runway

    wiki

    Whilst taking off from Charles de Gaulle Airport, Air France Flight 4590 ran over debris on the runway dropped by an aircraft during the preceding departure, causing a tyre to explode and disintegrate… five minutes before the Concorde departed, Continental Airlines Flight 55, a McDonnell Douglas DC-10-30, took off from the same runway for Newark International Airport and lost a titanium alloy strip that was part of the engine cowl…Concorde ran over this piece of debris during its take-off…cutting the right-front tyre of its left main wheel bogie and sending a large chunk of tyre debris into the underside of the left wing… It did not directly puncture any of the fuel tanks, but it sent out a pressure shockwave that ruptured the number 5 fuel tank at its weakest point, just ahead of the left landing gear well.