The concorde

[The Frenchman 0]

There was a caption that I just saw on CNN. Aparently, Concorde is going out of bussiness.

(I think I might have misunderstood so if someone could correct me)

[Col. Kurtz 0]

Air France will stop operating the Concorde after this Sunday I think, and British Airways plan to stop Concorde operations in October, so yes the Concorde is going out, too expensive to run and too few passengers.

[FSPilot 0]

I love the airplane, but who needs to get across the atlantic in 2-3 hours?

Not worth the costs of keeping it airworthy.

[ralphwiggum 6]

I love the airplane, but who needs to get across the atlantic in 2-3 hours?

Not worth the costs of keeping it airworthy.

playboys, celebrities, retiring people who want once in a life time expereience.

pity that i don't get the chance to ride it, but i guess retirement is inevitable, especially after Paris tragedy.

hopefully someone can come up with similar or better, but more stable and quiet jet.

[cam0flage 0]

I suggest we replace the Concorde with the Concordski - the Russian equivalent. Can't remember the designation of the aircraft, but I believe it was a Tupolev ... ;)

[VXR 9]

Boeing is making a Concorde style plane i believe

[Blaegis 0]

The Russian plane was Tupolev Tu-144. It's too bad the French crashed it at one of their airshows (was it Le Bourget?) because it was superior to the Concorde...

[VXR 9]

this is the one i was looking for

[attilauk 0]

There is a japanese project to build the next generation supersonic transport aircraft as well Here

[CoolCarlos2002 2]

I flew in a Concorde once from JFK to Heathrow, for a business purpose, it was amazing , too bad they aint gonna make them fly anymore

[soul_assassin 1750]

As far as I can remember there were two Tu-144 both in top conditions both crashed in france. One mysteriously plunged to ground on the airshow, later investigations of the footage showed a plane somewhat resembling a Mirage next to the Tu-144. Second one was crashed by a french pilot who couldnt get it out of a hangar. So yes I believe France sabotaged the design.

Anyaway the designs were remarcably similar that is because it was during the cold was and everyone was stealing scret info from everyone else.

[Ex-RoNiN 0]

Funky conspiracy theories, unfortunately a bit over the top.

Quote[/b] ]All six aboard the Tu-144 were killed as were eight French citizens on the ground. Why did the plane make the sudden move to level off? Only since the opening of the former Soviet Union has evidence surfaced to back up what had long been suspected. A French Mirage fighter had been ordered to shoot footage of the plane from above it and, as this was a covert operation, the Soviet pilots were not informed. The sudden, fatal maneuver was made to avoid a collision with the Mirage. The French government colluded with the Soviets to cover up the story (they conveniently lost the black box recorder and never publicly released a full report). In return, the French would not claim in their abbreviated report (little more than a press release) there was anything mechanically wrong with the Soviet aircraft.

The plane was also rather crap, considering it was nothing but a copy of the Concorde, stolen by various KGB agents.

Quote[/b] ]However, in their race to be first, the Soviets had taken shortcuts: Where they did not have complete blueprints for a critical part or when they did but they couldn't decipher the complex plans, they engineered it themselves. But they did so without the experience of the Western engineers who had designed each part to work well with all the rest. As an engineer who has spent several years perfecting the design of a wing for a particular plane can tell you, this lead to some fairly serious deficiencies in the design. Most notably, the plane was far less stable at slower speeds which lead to some harrowing landings.

So this is what happened in the TU-144's short life.

Quote[/b] ]The Soviets put the Tu-144 into service delivering mail Moscow and Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan on December 26, 1975. On November 1, 1977, the Tu-144 commenced passenger service on Aeroflot airlines on the same Moscow to Alma-Ata route. Mechanical problems plagued the new aircraft and prevented the aircraft from maintaining even its modest one flight per week schedule. On May 23, 1978, the first Tu-144D produced experienced a mechanical failure and crash landed. A week later (June 1, 1978), the 102nd and last passenger flight took place. Despite this, production of the Tu-144 continued through 1984. A total of 17 Tu-144's were manufactured, including a prototype and five D models.

From: http://www.super70s.com/Super70....144.asp

[nolips71 0]

The Russian plane was Tupolev Tu-144. It's too bad the French crashed it at one of their airshows (was it Le Bourget?) because it was superior to the Concorde...

dont want to be seemed to be sticking up for the frogs. but thats absolute crap. the tu 144 had very low g limits and crap engines. the russians crashed it at an airshow in france. the pilot stalled the engines. went into a steep dive. started the engines. pulled up. plane couldnt take the g force. it broke up. = cheap copy of concorde

[Tovarish 0]

The Russian plane was Tupolev Tu-144. It's too bad the French crashed it at one of their airshows (was it Le Bourget?) because it was superior to the Concorde...

dont want to be seemed to be sticking up for the frogs. but thats absolute crap. the tu 144 had very low g limits and crap engines. the russians crashed it at an airshow in france. the pilot stalled the engines. went into a steep dive. started the engines. pulled up. plane couldnt take the g force. it broke up. = cheap copy of concorde

Ugh...don't get me started...of course it's a POS...that's why NASA's used it as a testbed in the development of the next supersonic jetliner and a planned space liner. "cheap copies" generally don't fly before the original, and what's more, if you do your homework instead of dishing out this stale "the Russians copied everything" crap, you might find that the circumnstances that led to the crash in France included a Mirage fighter that got too close and forced the Tu-144 into evasive action.

Quote[/b] ]

However, in their race to be first, the Soviets had taken shortcuts: Where they did not have complete blueprints for a critical part or when they did but they couldn't decipher the complex plans, they engineered it themselves. But they did so without the experience of the Western engineers who had designed each part to work well with all the rest. As an engineer who has spent several years perfecting the design of a wing for a particular plane can tell you, this lead to some fairly serious deficiencies in the design. Most notably, the plane was far less stable at slower speeds which lead to some harrowing landings.

Funky conspiracy theories, a bit over the top unfortunately

Quote[/b] ]this is what happened in the TU-144's short life.

How about the resurection?

I get a feeling though, this'll turn into a he said/she said between forum members of French/British and Russian descent...sure looks like it already :P.

[Kued de Yar 0]

The concord was neat, but like already stated, not economically sound. I wish they would get a plane that could fly over any part of the country and be as fast as the jet, but man, they need to figure out something more fuel efficent.

[Blaegis 0]

Would've said the same things, but Tovarish got there first...  

Generally I'm always amazed at the prevailing opinion in the West that always assumes that whenever Russians built something, it was either crap or copied from an analogous piece of Western technology. What bullshit. I know the level of fundamental research and engineering education in the Soviet Union, and trust me, if you think that all those people did is reverse-engineer stolen hardware, you're deluded. That is not to say that the Russians didn't ...ahem "acquire" Western tech, they most certainly did. But let's not forget that both sides played that game. All is fair in love and war, as they say.

[FSPilot 0]

Well, they did photocopy a B-29.

[Guest]

It's a common side effect of the cold war. Anybody who has actually worked with Russian hardware or worked with Russian engineers knows that it is BS. Sure, there was a difference between Soviet and American/Western European technology. The Soviets missed the computerization era big time. On the other hand they had far superior basic science research. In areas like lasers, material science, nuclear reactors etc they are still today several decades ahead.

Another thing that gave Russian hardware a bad name is that after the absolvation of the Soviet Union there was a huge economic crisis. There was very little money for maintenance and after a while it took its toll on the hardware.

[Badgerboy 0]

There was talk last week of Branson picking Concorde up, and converting half of the seats to lower fares to trump up revenue. Seems there is a slight problem concerning the British Airways Concordes, as they don't want to sell them to Virgin. However, Concorde was originally paid for by the Government, so ownership is up in the air at the moment.

I hope they do keep in in operation. One accident in decades of service does not equal a 'deathtrap'. Plus its the only passenger aircraft in the world with afterburners! Swish!

[drewb99 0]

The Concorde performed remarkably well as a proof of concept, but not so well as a commercial airliner.

[ralphwiggum 6]

Brason again? geeze....is he still wearing that wedding dress?

anyways, if Virgin airline is going to acquire Concords, how does it expect to make it safer and profitable? I'm not dishing Branson's business ability, but seems a bit far-fetched.

[silent_64 0]

The Concorde is going out of service, what would you expect? The real question now is: Will this be the end of commercial supersonic air travel? Or will it only start a new or more economic bread of planes?

[FSPilot 0]

I think it's safe to say that the concorde going out of business, being the only supersonic airliner, would end commercial supersonic air travel for the time being.

[blackdog~ 0]

I don't think the world was ready for such a powerful and untested machine. They pushed this thing to the limit... if you ask me, a passenger plane wasn't ment to be hurled at Mach 2 over the Atlantic. The best way to do something like this is a reusable launch vehicle like NASA (or someone else) is building which can be launched, go into the atmosphere, wait 5 or 10 minutes, get halfway across the world, then land at an airport where it is repeated. Still, the consumption of full is a big matter for something like this.

If you ask me, the Concorde should have never gotten off the ground.

[Guest]

If you ask me, the Concorde should have never gotten off the ground.

It flew for 30 years with an unprecedented safety record.