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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 176.250.132.218 (talk) at 02:07, 2 March 2018 (→‎Retirement reasons: Questionable authority of the critic, addition of a different path forwards suggested.). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Good articleConcorde has been listed as one of the Engineering and technology good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.
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March 30, 2005Featured article candidateNot promoted
September 11, 2007Featured article candidateNot promoted
April 25, 2010Good article nomineeNot listed
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Current status: Good article

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Retirement reasons

" .. It has been suggested that Concorde was not withdrawn for the reasons usually given but that it became apparent during the grounding of Concorde that the airlines could make more profit carrying first-class passengers subsonically ..."

Not very likely. After Concorde was re-branded in the 1980's the British Airways fleet of seven Concordes generated up to 25% of BA's profits, a figure of around £500,000,000 (half a billion) pounds net profit.[1]

If BA had had their way, the aircraft would never have been retired in 2003. It was the withdrawal of the Concorde service by Air France and the resulting transfer of all the maintenance of certificating costs to BA by Airbus that forced BA reluctantly to withdraw too. Previously BA and AF had shared these costs, but with the withdrawal of Air France, BA could only support these increased costs with a large Concorde fare hike that was unrealistic.

Air France had withdrawn their Concorde service because of a general passenger boycott of Air France due to France's lack of support for the Second Gulf War.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.149.55.0 (talk) 09:13, 20 August 2017 (UTC)[reply]

For some reason, perhaps because of the traditional linguistic and trading ties between the UK and US, Air France were never as enthusiastic a Concorde user as was British Airways (or so it seemed), and as a result BA utilised its fleet far more then AF did, and the highest-time BA aircraft had around twice the flight hours (~23,000 hrs) of the AF Concorde (~11,000 hrs) that crashed in 2000.

In addition, on 9/11 BA had lost around 50 regular Concorde passengers who worked in the Financial Markets in New York and who were based in the World Trade Center, including a number of people from Cantor Fitzgerald. Quite a number of Brits worked in the WTC during the week and went home to the UK at weekends. By 2003 BA Concorde passenger numbers had started to pick up back to pre-9/11 levels but had not quite reached these earlier levels when the aircraft was withdrawn from service.

BTW, within BA the nickname for the aircraft was "The Rocket".— Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.150.18.209 (talk) 15:48, 14 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I would strongly recommend a rephrasing of the last section. Building the machinery to produce a few hundred thousand seals isn't going to be pocket-money, however it isn't going to require innovative design, either, and will be far less than a year's income. That phrase would be hard to justify quantitively, I feel, and such a case should be made to answer the worries about NPOV that that raises.
Similarly, Captain Lowe's further argument that it took seven years of testing to get her in the air misses the point completely, and further disproves his qualification to comment. My father, Reg Main, at that time a rising star of the mechanical engineering profession, was deeply involved in why it took so long to get her in the air. What actually happened is that the problems of such an innovative design proved greater than anticipated: for example, the first draft of the aircraft used fairly standard delta wing designs (such as the Avro Vulcan) which didn't have the headache of a supersonic speed. The first test flights soon discovered the problem, they would get close to the sound barrier and the engines would flame out. What was happening is that the shock wave of sound ahead of the aircraft pushed the air the engines needed to burn away from the nacelles, and so the engines flamed out, starved of air. To get past the problem, the nascelles had to be redesigned as described: these were the first to use such a variable design. That was not the only problem they found: the difference in the temperature of the airframe between standing on the apron at ground level and flying at speed at height meant the aircraft would expand an incredible amount, at speed it is several feet longer than on the ground. That meant the fuselage also had to be redesigned as well, to cope with that without losing pressure. All of this was ground-breaking engineering, and that took time to get right in hard, pragmatic, delivered reality, theory after theory had to be further refined from the experiences of the test designs, we have but must not abuse the benefit of hindsight here. Previous transsonic airframes were not pressurised, the typical image of a military pilot of the day is one of an oxygen helmet and pressure suit: the man was pressurised, not the airframe. However, these lessons were learned, and are in the Library of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, published in the IMechE's journal, The Engineer, so they don't need to be learned again, as Captain Lowe suggests. Such ignorance, sadly, reduces his comments to a matter of personal opinion rather than a substantiated fact.
A more relevant indication of a path forwards would be a reference to the several low-orbital projects under active development, from Richard Branson and Elon Musk, among others: you may also consider whether references to more hypothetical propositions such as the use of vacuum railways are appropriate, although I feel they are not, because the Encyclopaedia must remain rooted in reality. The low-orbital projects are nearing completion, and suggest a similar step-up in speed Concorde offered, making the revival of the aircraft less merchantable, unless a new generation of aircraft would be more acceptable to airlines in the mass-market sector, taking the other approach to travel, more and faster flights rather than ever larger payloads.
More questionable is whether we can still justify that use of fuel. Similarly, other regulatory headaches may make the project unviable for political reasons, however to conclude that the project is dead, as this meme does, lacks neutrality. You should allow time to tell, while retaining objective neutrality, and to some extent that may mean, with my historian's cap on, that you need a more anodyne and far simpler comment, restricting yourself to something like "Efforts to get some Concordes back in the air continue." That simple phrase allows time to tell: this is right in the middle of the academic norm excluding events within the last 25 years from the eminent domain of history, not least because many documents remain under secrecy embargo during that time.

I smell B.S.

"...It was later revealed that the original STAC report (preliminary design and shape--ed), marked "For UK Eyes Only", had secretly been passed to the French to win political favour. Sud made minor changes to the paper, and presented it as their own work..."

Typical British exaggeration of accomplishments and capabilities (See British Space Program, TSR2, DHC Comet, HOTOL, Beagle [Mars probe]), there are many such examples, but not enough time to document. One only has to look at the contemporary shapes of military and civilian aircraft--designed in Britain--to realize they were not capable of designing the elegant shape of the Concorde. Here are some examples--do you see anything approaching the Concorde? How about with the British English Electric? Or the De Haviland Comet? No?, then how about the Vickers Valiant? The Handley Page Victor? The Avro Vulcan? The Harrier? Do you see it? Neither do I. Dig a little deeper and we see some truly strange proposals under Bristol (British) Type 223--which amazingly enough, are oddly shaped much like a typical British aircraft. The final design does bear a resemblance, and looks like a rip off of the French or Russian design. With the French aircraft design we have the Mirage III. How about the Mirage IV? I see a lineage. Or the French proposal, the Super Caravelle. Smaller than the final variant, but the design? Bingo--right down to the wing. [Reference: http://aerospacebristol.org/the-story-of-concorde/] — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.30.58.105 (talk)

Your ref above says "The Bristol design team was given the go ahead to develop a 110-seat long-range supersonic airliner, known as 'Type 223'. At the same time, Aerospatiale of France was developing their similar 'Super Caravelle'. To save costs, the development projects were combined, and the result was the Anglo-French Concorde." Seems to be pretty straightforward to me. - Ahunt (talk) 21:37, 3 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Typical British exaggeration ... Wikipedia is no place for original research or ideas of this kind. See also WP:NPOV where it explains neutral point of view, one of the pillars of Wikipedia. Dolphin (t) 02:03, 4 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
See the Fairey Delta 2 of 1954. If flew a year before any Mirage. It also had a 'drooping nose' like Concorde.
The two SST projects were originally for two different aircraft, the French one was for a short-ranged supersonic airliner to be used within Europe, the British one was for a transatlantic aircraft to be used on longer ranges. The short-ranged one was calculated to be unprofitable for the airlines over such short ranges and unlikely to sell, so the best of the two designs were combined for a transatlantic aircraft and the result was Concorde.
On short flights the aircraft spends too great a proportion of the Mach 2 flight accelerating and decelerating, so that the reduction in overall flight times over a subsonic airliner is much less than it would be on a longer journey as it spends a smaller proportion of the flight travelling at Mach 2. Concorde took around fifteen to twenty minutes, including ten minutes of reheat, to accelerate while climbing from subsonic up to Mach 2, although it could decelerate and descend at the other end of the flight much more rapidly if needed using reverse thrust on the two inner engines. IIRC, the maximum rate-of-descent possible was quite extreme, around 10,000 fpm. This was originally a requirement of the then-new SST Certificating conditions, which required a rapid rate-of-descent should a cabin window burst, and which was later made unnecessary by the incorporation into the Concorde design of an additional pressurization/air conditioning unit that, in conjunction with the existing units, provided sufficient combined capacity to maintain breathable cabin pressure for a more normal descent despite a blown window. The time taken to accelerate to the aircraft's cruise speed was also one of the (numerous) reasons for the cancellation of the competing US B-2707 Mach 2.7 airliner project, as the even-more prolonged acceleration times (compared to those of a Mach 2 aircraft like Concorde) made the aircraft potentially unprofitable for the airlines on any other than the longest trans-Pacific routes, which, at the time, possessed too low passenger traffic to make a Mach 2.7 airliner viable for any airline.
Concorde needed the two countries combined to be what it was, the French to give it style, the British to give it class. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.149.247.16 (talk)
"Concorde needed the two countries combined to be what it was, the French to give it style, the British to give it class." Got a reference for that? - Ahunt (talk) 11:15, 6 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Alas no, that was my own contribution. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.150.18.209 (talk) 15:22, 14 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Note that Wikipedia is not a discussion forum. See WP:NOT#FORUM. --Finlayson (talk) 19:53, 30 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Pan Air Do Brasil

If the TIME reference provided in the article supports the claims made in the 'Sales Efforts' section, it is impossible to see because of the TIME paywall. The other sources do not support the notion that Pan Air Do Brasil was the first company to option Concorde. In fact, other sources (not provided in the article) e.g. here and here mention an option in 1963 and no earlier. If a citation for the 1961 figure—which is before the Anglo-French Agreement was even formalized—cannot be found, then the claim should be removed from the table. Cheers, Finktron (talk) 17:44, 9 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The 1961 order for Sud Caravelles included an option for three "Super Caravelles" which later was assumed to be for Concordes and certainly the president of Panair do Brasil in 1963 took pride in that they were the first airline to order Concordes. Certainly flight in 1963 showed that Panair did have options or reservations for three aircraft but I dont think it was confirmed or became anything more than a reservation. So they did place a reservation or option in 1961 for Concorde although it didnt exist! Panair went belly up in 1965 so nothing came of it. MilborneOne (talk) 21:41, 9 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@MilborneOne: I do see mention of a letter of intent put forth by Panair in 1961 for three Super Caravelles, per Esso Aviation News Digest pg. 47, which you can see using search terms like "Panair will take". The wording here is important, however, because that same source mentions options for Caravelle VIRs. LOIs differ from options; Panair Do Brasil did not have an option proper in 1961, though based on the sources I linked earlier, it does seem they put in proper options at the later 1963 date. As such, it does not appear that Panair can claim to be first to properly option Concorde, even if they had an LOI issued for what amounts to half of Concorde's predecessor. This isn't pedantry, especially when one considers that Panair—shortly to go under—never could have made good on its LOI nor later option, whereas the other organizations listed in the article specifically chose not to exercise their options. Mentioning Panair optioning Concorde in the narrative section of 'Sales Efforts' is fine, especially with the foregoing book source. Putting Panair at the top of list the is not, because that list specifically refers to options. Let me know what you think. Thanks, Finktron (talk) 23:22, 9 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Clearly worth a mention as Panair did believe they had a "reservation" but it doesnt appear to have turned into a formal option so I would agree it should be in the narrative but not the table. MilborneOne (talk) 20:51, 11 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

STAC

This article breaks out the acronym STAC as Supersonic Transport Advisory Committee, which is definitely attested to in Conway's High-Speed Dreams. I am a bit confused, though, because the Wikipedia article for Bristol Type 223 refers to STAC as the Supersonic Transport Aircraft Committee. Are both names valid? Was there a name change at some point? There appear to me to be more references to an Aircraft Committee than an Advisory Committee in the literature, e.g. at the U.K. National Archives, in official NASA reports on supersonic aircraft, in much more contemporary news articles on Concorde, etc. Is there any kind of definitive answer to this question? Cheers, Finktron (talk) 00:41, 12 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I suspect that when the committee was first formed it was not known if any aircraft would subsequently be ordered and so the committee was operating in an initial advisory capacity at first in order to assist in the formulation of any requirement for such an aircraft. Later when the requirement for such an aircraft was better defined the committee name may have changed to include the specific 'aircraft' when such an aircraft had definitely become a possibility and of interest. But that's just my guess.
Initially, with the technology of the time, it would not have been known if a supersonic passenger aircraft was possible, so the aircraft would not have been a concrete possibility. Later it had become one, and so the name of the committee may have been changed to reflect this. But as I wrote, that's just a guess. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.150.18.209 (talk) 15:32, 14 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
When they released a report in 1959 the London Times called it the supersonic transport aircraft committee. The committee had been formed by the Ministry of Supply in November 1956 and recommended two aircraft, a Mach 2 150-passenger transatlantic aircraft and a Mach 1.2 100-passenger aircraft for stage lengths up to 1500 miles. MilborneOne (talk) 21:19, 30 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

BA purchase price contradiction

Article initially states British Airways paid £1 per aircraft, total of £7. Later on it states Lord King, the head of BA, paid £16.5 million plus the first year's profits. Later on again, the article quotes Richard Branson's offer to pay 'the original £1 per aircraft'. So, was it £1 per aircraft, or is the Lord King section correct? 213.202.174.162 (talk) 22:58, 11 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

'The original £1 per aircraft' sale was a 'sale' in law only, as the 'owners' of the airline also already owned the aircraft.
At the time of the handing-over of the Concordes into airline service in 1977 both British Airways (BA) and Air France (AF) were nationalised companies owned by each respective nation's taxpayers. These same taxpayers had also paid for the design and construction of the aircraft, and were therefore legally also the owners of each aircraft built. Hence the 'owners' of the airline had already paid for the aircraft.
The original "£1" per-aircraft purchase price was a token payment by BA necessary to make the transfer of ownership from the manufacturer/government to the airline (a distinct corporate body) a legal sale with all the benefits/obligations that under consumer law come with the purchase of any item, and this itself was necessary because legally the taxpayer already owned both the aircraft, and the airline, and so if the aircraft were just 'given' to BA with no payment of money made the transfer would have been otherwise lacking the rights and obligations set out in contract law. Without this, things such as the aircraft, engine, and other equipment warranties, aircraft and engine performance guarantees, etc., would have been invalid and the 'customer' (BA) would have had no legal recourse against the manufacturer or equipment suppliers if the aircraft had proved faulty or unsatisfactory. By paying the £1 nominal payment the airline obtained the aircraft with all the normal legal benefits and safeguards as a buyer it would have had if it had purchased an aircraft from any other source.
In 1987 BA was privatised and so Lord King then had to pay the government (taxpayer) the real value (£16.5 million, etc.,) for each aircraft using money supplied by the private investors who had bought the company. This was a real sale.
Branson's 2003 "£1" offer was taking-the-p***s as the previous 1977 one-pound per-aircraft 'price' had not been a market value, but merely a legal device to transfer a piece (or rather seven pieces) of nationalised property to an also-nationalised company whilst giving the latter (BA) all the normal legal benefits of a commercial sale. Branson's lawyers would/should have told him this, and so the offer was most likely a publicity stunt. For one thing, BA was not likely to willingly retire an aircraft that generated a considerable portion of their profits, and after being forced to do so, they certainly wouldn't have sold it to a competitor to then operate. In addition all the Concorde-qualified engineering staff were at either BA or AF and Branson would have needed their services if he had acquired the aircraft.
So in answer to your original question, they both are correct. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.149.173.52 (talk) 10:48, 21 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Where's the source of it being exactly £1? I watched the video and Heseltine says 'we gave it to them'. That's not £1. Also, my understanding is that BA didn't own the aircraft outright, that 80% of the profits were to be kept by the government.GliderMaven (talk) 14:42, 22 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I was merely answering a question but IIRC the original sum was £1, and for the reason I stated. IIRC, it was only for the first year the privatised BA had to pay some of its profits back to the government (taxpayer). After that it wholly-owned the Concordes. I'm not sure about 1977 but back in 1999 many of the BA aircraft I worked on were owned by merchant banks and leased to BA, however the Concordes were actually owned by the company.
Michael Heseltine wasn't in power when the Concorde entered airline service in 1977, he was in opposition to James Callaghan's Labour Government so he may have been making a political point. In 1987 when BA was privatised he was in Margaret Thatcher's Conservative government. By then the seven BA Concordes were already ten years old.
According to Flight here:[2] pre-privatisation BA was required to pay the government (taxpayer) 80% of its Concorde profits to recover some of the aircraft's development costs, and the £16.5 million figure was paid in 1984 in return for not having to pay the 80% share of the Concord profits, and taking over responsibility from the government for the Concorde upkeep and support costs previously paid by the latter. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.149.173.52 (talk) 15:36, 22 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Oh right, so you're saying, as an anonymous source here, that Wikipedia is supposed to reflect your memory of the original sum???? Yeah, no, we're not going to do that. We need an actual reliable source to the exact sum that we can reference. I mean, yeah, BA owned their Concordes lock-stock and two smoking barrels in 1999, after they'd paid millions for them, but not in 1971. And maybe BA paid one pound for something, or not, but they clearly didn't own Concorde outright for one pound.GliderMaven (talk) 17:33, 22 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Also, you stated above that: "In 1987 BA was privatised and so Lord King then had to pay the government (taxpayer) the real value (£16.5 million, etc.,) for each aircraft using money supplied by the private investors who had bought the company. This was a real sale." This is also very wrong. BA bought Concorde in 1983, four years before BA was privatised.GliderMaven (talk) 17:33, 22 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sorry, but I'm going to remove the £1 claim, it's fictitious and unreferenced.GliderMaven (talk) 17:33, 22 December 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Supposed erroneous information

Please, check phrase in article: "The first flight with passengers after the accident took place on 11 September 2001, landing shortly before the World Trade Center attacks in the United States." Source don't confirm that. Compare information in these sources:

  1. Fox News
  2. BBC News
  3. BBC News (this is 'dubious', if compared with the source 2). PauloMSimoes (talk) 18:55, 19 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
The text is referring the the first commercial flight (with passengers). The first 2 articles linked above are about the first test flight after the crash, while the 3rd is about the first commercial flight. You seem to be missing the difference between the two types of flights here. -Finlayson (talk) 19:54, 19 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Source in article says: "A British Airways Concorde made its first passenger flight Monday since last year's Paris crash that killed 113 people, the UK Press Association reported." 11 Sep 2001 was Tuesday! And where is in source, the flight take-off/landing times? Besides, was not "the first commercial flight"; per source: "The passengers were all BA engineers who have worked to make the Concorde airworthy again". A 20-minute flight commercial? I know the difference. PauloMSimoes (talk) 21:44, 19 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Think nothing of it. Article: "Normal commercial operations resumed on 7 November 2001". PauloMSimoes (talk) 22:48, 19 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

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