Concorde is very expensive, and the round-trip ticket from London to new york costs more than 9000 dollars. Traveling to and from Europe and America by Concorde is a dream of many people since childhood. The flight from Europe to new york takes less than three and a half hours, and because the time difference between London and new york is four hours, passengers on Concorde like to say, "I arrived before I left." .
On July 25th, 2000, Concorde flight AF4590 ran over a small iron bar dropped on the runway by another continental airline, DC- 10, resulting in a flat tire, and the tire fragments hit the fuel tank in the wing at a high speed exceeding the speed of sound. Then a fire broke out, causing the plane to explode a few minutes after takeoff and crash in a hotel near the airport. This is the only major accident during the service of Concorde. This is also the first time in history that a supersonic jet crashed. 1 13 people were killed in this tragedy. The crash prompted the aircraft manufacturer to redesign the fuselage design and repair many defects. Even the fuel tank is protected by Kevlar (often used as bulletproof vest) to prevent the fuel tank from being punctured by high-speed foreign objects in the future. Nevertheless, the whole crash process was filmed with home video equipment, which caused serious psychological shock to the public. No matter how prestigious the plane was in the past, only one crash brought Concorde down. Although Concorde 200 1, 1 1 has been re-launched, the passenger capacity has been seriously insufficient. Concorde finally retired in 2003 due to serious losses of airlines.
By April 2003, there were still 12 commercial flights. On1October 24th, 2003, 10, Concorde made its last flight. In the process of research and development, the research teams of the two countries have a close relationship and often exchange views. By the early 1960s, these two designs had initially entered the prototype construction stage. However, due to the huge investment, the British government asked British aircraft companies to find international partners. After discussions with several countries (including Germany and the United States), only France is interested in the cooperation plan. Britain and France can reach understanding and cooperation on the supersonic passenger plane plan, mainly because the design schemes of the two countries are very close, and there are great similarities in speed, range and aerodynamic layout. Cooperative development helps to bear the cost equally. On the other hand, Boeing 707 and Douglas DC-8 quickly occupied a large share of the European civil airliner market. French President Charles de Gaulle did not want to see the European market monopolized by American aircraft manufacturers, so he also encouraged the two countries to cooperate, speed up the research and development, and strive to seize the market before the appearance of American supersonic passenger aircraft. The cooperation plan was not formulated by the two companies, but negotiated by the British and French governments in the form of international treaties. At the proposal of French President Charles de Gaulle and British Prime Minister Macmillan, the draft cooperation plan was formally signed on1October 28th, 1962+065438. This plan also includes a clause put forward by the British side that if either party cancels the cooperation, it must pay huge compensation (the British Treasury almost canceled the cooperation plan twice). At this time, Bristol Aircraft Company and French Southern Aircraft Company have merged with other companies to form British Aircraft Company and French Aerospace Company respectively.
background
Since the 1950s, with the popularity of subsonic jet passenger aircraft and the appearance of the first practical supersonic military aircraft-F100 Super Sabre fighter, supersonic passenger aircraft was generally regarded as the future development direction at that time, and the Soviet Union, Britain, France and the United States all planned to develop supersonic passenger aircraft one after another. 1956, the British government set up the supersonic transport aircraft Committee (STAC), and conducted joint research with RAE and Bristol Aircraft Company, and began to explore the feasibility of developing the world's first supersonic passenger aircraft. By 1959, the Committee reached a preliminary conclusion that supersonic passenger aircraft was technically feasible, and suggested that two kinds of supersonic passenger aircraft should be researched and manufactured, namely, the short-haul passenger aircraft with Mach 1.2 and the medium-range passenger aircraft with Mach 2.0. At that time, the British Bristol Aircraft Company received huge funding from the British government, and put forward the Bristol 198(Bristol 198) plan according to the recommendations of the Committee. The design of Bristol 198 is transatlantic flight, with six turbojet engines, which can carry 130 passengers at supersonic speed. However, because this design theory is too heavy, the economy of six engines is questioned. Bristol Aircraft Company later introduced a reduced version of Bristol 198-Bristol 223, which is a supersonic passenger plane with delta wings and four engines. The cruising speed is Mach 2, which can carry about 100 passengers and can fly across the Atlantic Ocean.
At the same time, France has a similar plan, and the progress is similar to that of Britain. Sud Airlines and Dassault jointly conducted research and put forward the design scheme of Super-Caravelle, which is also a delta wing with a cruising speed of Mach 2.2 and can carry about 70 passengers.
At first, the two sides planned to build a long-range (6,000 km) and a short-range (4,400 km) supersonic passenger aircraft, but after promoting these two models to potential customers, they found that airlines were not interested in short-range supersonic passenger aircraft, so they decided to cancel the short-range aircraft. Long-range aircraft received more than 65,438+000 intentional orders. The initial customers included Pan Am, British Overseas Airlines (BOAC) and Air France, which ordered six Concorde planes respectively. Other subscribed airlines include Pan Am, Continental Airlines, Japan Airlines, Lufthansa, American Airlines, United Airlines, air india, Air Canada, Braniff International Airlines, Singapore Airlines, Iranian Airlines, Olympic Airlines, Qantas, China Civil Aviation, Middle East Airlines and TWA. According to the most conservative estimate at that time, the number of orders for 1975 would rise to 225.
After obtaining the support of enough airlines, the development plan of supersonic passenger aircraft jointly developed by Britain and France began immediately. According to the agreement, the development of the aircraft fuselage will be jointly carried out by British Aircraft Corporation and French Aerospace Corporation, with the project allocation ratio of 40% and 60%; The engines of the aircraft are jointly carried out by rolls royce Company of England and Snak & Ma Company of France, and the project allocation ratio is 60% and 40% respectively. The overall assembly sites of the aircraft are located in Felton, England and Toulouse, France. It was originally planned to trial-produce two prototypes, the development cost was 65.438+0.5 billion, and the planned price was about 6.5438+0.5 million to 6.5438+0.7 million each. The first prototype is scheduled to fly at the end of 1966, and the airworthiness certificate is expected to be obtained at 1969. By 1966, Britain and France decided to expand the research and development scale, adding two pre-production machines (production numbers are10/and 102) and two mass production machines (production numbers are 20 1 and 202) for static test and metal fatigue test.
1964, the British Labour Party won the general election, and Harold Wilson became the British Prime Minister. Faced with the fiscal deficit at that time, the British government planned to withdraw its capital and withdraw from the cooperation plan. To this end, the French President personally came forward, stressing the need for Britain to fulfill a paper agreement signed in 1962, and understanding the consequences of unilaterally refusing to fulfill the agreement. Due to TSR-2, Britain was forced to continue to invest, so several aircraft development projects were cancelled one after another, including AW.68 1 short takeoff and landing transport aircraft (Armstrong whitworth AW.68 1) and P. 154 supersonic vertical/short takeoff and landing fighter (Hoxhide P./. 1963,65438+10, 13. At that time, French President Charles de Gaulle took the lead in naming this supersonic passenger plane "Concorde" in French. In order to show the sincerity of cooperation to France, Britain agreed to adopt the French name, but later France refused Britain to join the European economy. David Macmillan, the British Prime Minister at that time, changed his mind, thinking that French President Charles de Gaulle had neglected Britain in naming planes, and decided to change the name of Concorde to Concorde in English (Concorde also means harmony and coordination in English). It was not until1967 65438+February 1 1 that the first Concorde plane left the factory in Toulouse, France, that the naming of the plane was settled. On the same day, British Minister of Science and Technology Tony Benn announced that Britain would like to use the original name and call Concorde "Concorde". However, this has also caused controversy in Britain. Some British people think that the cooperative plan was first put forward by Britain to France and should be named in English. In order to dispel doubts, Bint immediately explained the meaning of the last word "e". He believes that "e" can stand for Excellence, Britain, Europe and friendly agreement. In his memoirs, Bint recalled that he received a letter from Scots, which said, "You said' E' stands for England, but some parts of Concorde were made in Scotland!" . In fact, the nose of Concorde was indeed produced and assembled in Scotland. In his reply, Bint said: "E can also stand for ‘Ecosse' (the name of Scotland in French), but it can also stand for extravagance and upgrading!"
In 1950s, with the application of jet engines and swept wings, fighter planes realized supersonic and double-sonic flight. With the maturity of jet passenger aircraft, the civil aviation industry pays more attention to supersonic passenger aircraft. It is predicted that in the1960s, airlines need an airplane that can fly long distances and reach their destinations quickly. The United States, the Soviet Union, Britain, France and other countries have begun to explore the development of supersonic large aircraft.
From 1956 to 196 1, supersonic passenger aircraft were studied in Britain and France respectively. Due to the high development cost and similar schemes between the two countries, Britain/France signed a government cooperation agreement at 1962. On this agreement, SST (Supersonic Transport Plan) is put forward. Concorde supersonic airliner is the product of SST plan. The huge development cost will be shared equally by the British and French governments. 1963 65438+ 10, then French president Charles de gaulle personally named this development plan Concord. The prototype of Concorde began to be manufactured in 1965. The first Concorde 00 1 aircraft assembled in France1967 65438+February1KLOC-0/left the factory, and the Concorde 1969 made its first flight in March and 65438+1October in the same year. The first Concorde 002 aircraft assembled in Britain also made its first flight in April 1969. At the end of 0975, we obtained 65438+ type certificates from both countries and put them into use. 0976+2 1 65438+65438 was put into commercial flight. Concorde stopped production in 1979, producing a total of 20 aircraft, which were produced in Britain and France 10. Among them, there are 2 prototypes, 2 pre-production models and 6 production models/kloc-0. In addition to the two production models used for testing, British Airways and Air France each had seven, and later Air France 1 retired. Finally, Concorde was completely retired in 2003.
On May 3, 2003, KLOC-0, Air France's Concorde made its last commercial flight. On1October 24th, 2003, 10, British Airways Concorde completed its last flight. In February, construction of two prototypes began.No. 1965:00 1 was built by the French Aerospace Company in Toulouse, and No.002 was built by the British Aircraft Company in felton, Bristol. Concorde made its first flight in Toulouse on March 2, 1969. The test pilot is Andre? André Turcat made his first supersonic flight on June 5438+1 October1day of the same year and lasted for 9 minutes, with the highest speed reaching Mach 1.5; 1970165438+10 month, successfully reaching Mach 2.0. 00 1 and flew to south America on September 4 197 1, which was the first transatlantic flight of Concorde.
Concorde 002 made its first flight from felton to Fairford in Gloucestershire on April 9th 1969, with Brian as the test pilot. Brian Trubshaw. Fairford Air Force Base has been used as a test center for Concorde made in Britain from 1969 to 1977. Then on June 2nd, the plane1972,002 set off for the Middle East, the Far East and Australia *** 12 countries for a tour, with a total flight distance of 72,500 kilometers. Concorde (002) made its first flight to the United States on 1973 and landed at the newly-built Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, marking the official opening of the airport.
1970 At the Osaka World Expo, Britain and France jointly brought a promotional film of Concorde to the exhibition site, showing the world this brand-new aircraft completely different from all kinds of civil airliners in the world at that time, and vigorously promoted it. These roving exhibitions brought more than 70 new orders for Concorde, but at the same time, a series of unexpected unfavorable factors led to the cancellation of a large number of early intentional orders, including the oil crisis of 1973 (the fuel consumption of Concorde is higher than other subsonic passenger planes), the financial problems of some airlines ordering Concorde, and the existence of 144 at 1973. By 1976, only four countries are still interested in buying, including Britain, French, China and Iranian. In the end, only Air France and British Airways (the successor of British Overseas Airlines) bought it, and the two governments shared part of the profits from the operation of Concorde. Take British Airways as an example. Concorde was purchased with a loan provided by the government to British Airways, and the British government recovered 80% of the profits from Concorde until 1984.
After entering 1974, British Airways and Air France began to use Concorde for various demonstrations and flight tests. The flight test of Concorde still keeps many records. The prototype, pre-production machine and the first mass production machine flew a total of 5335 hours, of which 2000 hours were supersonic flight, and the total test flight time was far more than four times that of the same size subsonic civil airliner in the same period. 1976 65438+ 10, Concorde officially put into flight on this route. So far, the British and French governments have invested more than 800 million pounds in supersonic passenger aircraft projects, nearly six times more than the original budget (65.438+0.5 billion pounds). 1977, the actual price of Concorde was 23 million pounds (US$ 46 million), which was 6 million pounds higher than the expected price. But according to the budget at that time, Concorde had to sell at least 64 planes to make ends meet. As a result, the huge development cost cannot be recovered at all.
British Aircraft Corporation (later became British Aerospace Corporation) and French Aerospace Corporation (later became European Aerospace Defense Group) are the co-owners of Concorde type certificate. After the establishment of Airbus Group, type certificate was transferred to Airbus to continue to provide maintenance and support for Concorde.
Concord type b
In order to meet the needs of long-term supersonic cruise, Concorde has adopted measures such as high-efficiency turbojet engine and large-capacity fuel tank, so Concorde is also the supersonic aircraft with the strongest endurance so far, and it can fly more than 7,000 kilometers at supersonic speed with one refueling. However, the range of Concorde is still much shorter than that of other subsonic civil aircraft. Take Boeing 747-400 as an example, its range can reach 13450 km.
1976, four months after the commercial flight of Concorde, British Aircraft Corporation and French Aerospace Corporation jointly put forward the design scheme of the next generation Concorde, which is called Concorde B. The improvement of Concorde B focuses on increasing the range, including increasing the fuel tank capacity, slightly increasing the wing area and increasing the leading edge flap to further improve the low-speed performance during take-off and landing. As for the engine, the afterburner was cancelled to increase the diameter of the compressor, and a first-stage low-pressure turbine was added instead, and a noise reduction device was installed. This new engine is 25% more efficient than the existing Olympus 593. At that time, it was predicted that the range of Concorde B could be extended by 805 kilometers (500 nautical miles) than Concorde, and the carrying capacity was also increased, which enabled airlines to develop more supersonic routes. However, in the face of the bleak sales situation of Concorde and the influence of the second oil crisis, Concorde B plan was finally cancelled.