Mention Concorde to almost anyone who remembers it and the reaction is likely to be one of awe and misty-eyed nostalgia.
“Concorde was the eighth wonder of the world,” says Sir David Frost, the British broadcaster, who during the 1970s commuted weekly on the supersonic jet to host shows in New York and London. “It made a big difference to how rested one felt. You also had the ability to be in two places at once; you could be in London at 10 o’clock, and then in New York at 9.15. It gave a feeling of beating the clock.”
Such is the aircraft’s romantic legacy; when a flight from London to New York would take four hours, rather than the usual eight – a legacy no doubt intensified by the present-day rigmarole experienced by exhausted air passengers at most international airports. The idea that you could cross continents in a matter of hours seduces us today more than ever. And it is a concept that is particularly frustrating for those who once enjoyed efficient supersonic travel, now the reserve of military personnel.
“It’s the first time in the history of the world that progress has gone backwards,” laments the director and writer Michael Winner who used to travel regularly by Concorde to New York and Barbados. “When I first went to New York in 1953 you had to stop in Iceland to refuel. Later you could do it directly but it was always a nightmare; you had to wait forever, you didn’t have a special lounge – you were treated like cattle. Airports are my idea of hell, but when you were dealing with Concorde it was actually very pleasant.”
The demise of Concorde was predominantly a result of falling profits – not enough people were buying the tickets necessary to keep the aircraft airborne. This was twinned with the Concorde crash in Paris in 2000 that killed all 109 people on board. The fleet was eventually grounded in 2003 much to the disappointment of its regular passengers and aviation fanatics.
“When Concorde was tragically taken from us, we skipped back in to the old routine and stopped trying to be in New York for breakfast – we returned to the early 1970s,” Sir David says.
Mr Winner agrees: “How can achievements in engineering and flight be terminated and we go back to these dreadful stone age planes?”
Even as first and business class travel becomes more comfortable with the introduction of flat beds and private cabins, the die-hard fans will not be placated. “There’s no comparison – you’re on the plane for so much longer,” says Mr Winner. “You only have to look at Concorde to see it is a thing of immense beauty. You were in a groundbreaking machine; it was still interesting to see it go double the speed of sound even after decades [of Concorde being operational].”
But where there’s a will, there’s a way, and although the return of mass commercial supersonic air travel is still some way off, the second dawn of speedy business travel, may not be so far away – for those who can afford it.
One company that hopes to make supersonic flight available within the next six years is the US-based Aerion Corporation, with its Aerion jet. “What we’re selling is convenience and speed,” says Michael Henderson, chief operation officer. “Speed gives you two things: comfort and the ability to operate when you get to where you’re going. It allows you to schedule a trip because you have much more flexibility for when you get there and when you return. It’s that promise that keeps people interested [in supersonic flight].”
The process has not been without its challenges. For most countries, the aviation laws concerning supersonic flight require simply that there is no disturbing sonic boom – the sound created when an aircraft breaks the sound barrier – while in the US there is a blanket prohibition on supersonic flight. For the transatlantic Aerion jet to be economically viable therefore, it needed a design that enabled it to fly efficiently at both sub- and supersonic speeds.
While other companies have been trying to design aircraft with less disturbing sonic booms – designs that would still require legislative change in the US before such aircraft could become operational – Aerion plans to use special wings that employ an advanced laminar flow design, which enables the plane to operate within current environmental and legislative guidelines.
“We have a plane that is still very efficient when it must fly subsonically [over the US],” says Mr Henderson. “This allows us earlier entry into service without any rule changes.”
If all goes to plan, by 2013 Aerion will be running transatlantic jets capable of flying 12 passengers from Chicago to London in under six hours, bringing civilian air travel back up to date and returning Concorde’s devotees from the stone age.
