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View Full Version : Concorde Crash in Paris: 9 Years Ago Today



Matt Molnar
2009-07-25, 05:01 PM
NYCAviation:

On This Day in Aviation History: July 25th (http://nycaviation.com/2009/07/25/on-this-day-in-aviation-history-july-25th/)

1909, French aviator Louis Blériot makes the first crossing of the English Channel with a heavier-than-air machine. The 37 minute flight from Calais to Dover was completed aboard Blériot’s own Blériot XI, a biplane constructed mainly of oak, poplar and cloth and powered by a 25hp engine. The effort was made in response to a challenge published by London’s Daily Mail newspaper. Blériot’s prize: £1000. The feat earned him immediate fame, and his company went on to produce over 800 planes, including fighters used in World War I.

1973, the Soviet Union launches Mars 5, the fifth of seven of probes sent to the red planet in the 1960s and 70s. Mars 5 would reach Mars in February of 1974, where it would transmit about 60 photos back to Earth before losing pressurization.

1984, Cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya becomes the first woman to perform a space walk, floating around the Salyut 7 space station for over 3 1/2 hours.

2000, Air France Flight 4590, a chartered Concorde aircraft scheduled to fly a German tour group from Paris to meet a cruise ship in New York, crashes immediately after takeoff from Charles de Gaulle International Airport in Paris, killing all 109 passengers and 4 people on the ground. The accident would mark the beginning of the end of supersonic commercial flight; less than three years later, all Concordes would be retired.

Jetinder
2009-08-02, 10:23 PM
I heard about it on my way to work and was extremely gutted when i saw the photos and videos on BBC news.

Over the following weeks and months we finally found out what caused the accident and I thought this is the end for Concorde, she will never fly.

But when I heard Airbus, AF and BA where determined to get her back my heart jumped for utter joy.

Its sad to think that a few years after that Airbus and AF decided to ground the same Concordes they helped to get back in the air.

What an utter waste of time, effort and money .........