The Only Bad Flight In The History Of Concorde

The Concorde was the worlds first super sonic jet plane. The joint effort of both the French and British governments it debuted in 1969 and proved to be a success from the start and a hit with the public. It maintained a perfect safety record for over 30 years until July 25th, 2000 when it suffered its only crash. It took place in Paris, France at Charles Degaulle Airport. Just ahead of it on the runway was a Continental DC-10 which was taking off and heading for Texas. As it lifted up somehow a small piece of metal about 4 inches long fell off during the stresses of takeoff and ended up on the runway. The Concorde being next to takeoff followed its usual procedure and sped up as it made its way down the runway to gather up enough speed to lift into the air. Investigators estimate that it was traveling at about a speed of 200 MPH when her left wheel came into contact with the metal strip left on the tarmac by the previous Continental Flight. The small piece of titanium shredded the tire causing small chunks of rubber to fly up into the air at speeds that were about equivalent to that of a bullet shot from a gun. One of the chunks of rubber flies up and strikes the Concorde on the left side of the jet under its wing where the fuel tanks for the plane are located. The rubber traveling at such a high speed impacts the tank which causes a shock wave that ignites a fire in the wing but the jet still manages to lift off and become airborne. Citizens in Paris witnessed the plane in flight over the city traveling with its left wing engulfed in flames trailing black smoke behind it. The jet remained in the air for about two minutes when it finally came crashing down directly upon a hotel called The Relais Bleu which was located about ten miles outside of Paris. One hundred passengers were killed along with a flight crew of nine and four others on the ground. Most of the passengers on this particular flight were German. They were tourists on their way to J.F.K. Airport in order to connect with a cruise ship that was headed for Ecuador. The Incident marred an otherwise flawless flight record for the Concorde that had been in tact since the inception of the plane 30 years before. After the crash all Concorde flights were grounded for a time. The fleet itself was finally retired in 2003 for economic reasons rather than safety ones. The planes were no longer cost effective to fly because they used excessive amounts of jet fuel that were too costly for their continued operation.