How Long Was The Concorde In Service

(CNN) — Terminal calendar month, a Virgin Atlantic Boeing 787 Dreamliner hitched a ride on a powerful jet stream and flew from Los Angeles to London in a record-setting nine hours and 13 minutes, hitting 801 miles per hour as it flew over Pennsylvania.

Record-setting, mayhap, but for a subsonic airliner.

Half a century ago, the legendary supersonic rider airliner Concorde made its first test flying, on March 2, 1969. The Concorde 001 prototype took off from Toulouse, piloted by André Turcat, and showtime went supersonic on October 1.

In 1976 -- over 40 years agone -- aristocracy passengers were crossing the Atlantic in under three and a half hours, flying at twice the speed of sound in the Anglo-French Concorde.

Only twenty of the sleek, delta-winged SSTs were built, and just fourteen were delivered to ii airlines -- seven each to Air France and British Airways.

With superlative service and cuisine, sectional airport lounges and stratospherically high airfares, Concorde passengers flew far above other flights, and cruised faster than fighter jets to their destinations.

Just what was information technology really like to rub shoulders with the rich and famous on a Concorde flight? CNN Travel asked some former passengers what it was like to fly on one.

Cozy quarters

"The flight attendants loved being on it; the passengers loved being on it," says CNN's Richard Quest, who flew Concorde 5 times. "You were aware of being office of a very small group of people that were privileged enough to be on Concorde.

"Concorde was extremely small, only about 100 seats. It had more like part chairs, bucket seats, and very pocket-sized windows. It was noisy, extremely noisy, but I challenge anybody not to accept a smiling from ear to ear when they got on it."

With an interior fuselage width of near 8 and a one-half feet (2.63 meters), Concorde's cabin was just wider than that of today's Bombardier Regional Jet. The SST had a unmarried alley, with a two-2 seating configuration.

"The actual layout of the airplane was in two sections. In that location was a front department, then a center lavatory, and so a rear department," explains Quest.

"The two sections were identical -- not like 1 was First Class and one was Business. Simply in that location was always a status symbol to being in the front department."

Decant earlier flying

While Concorde had its regulars, including international businessman Fred Finn -- who flew a tape-setting 718 times -- whatever number of novice passengers could be on lath for their ane-and-merely supersonic experience.

Like Su Marshall, a globe-trotting Canadian who was treated to an Air France flying from New York to Paris by her then-boyfriend, "who had more coin than Midas."

In the Concorde lounge at JFK, where the "Air France staff oozed élan," Marshall chatted with an elegant French woman, and admitted that it was her first flying on the SST.

"She was a Concorde regular, and whispered candidly to me, 'You better go to the washroom now. It is impossible to pee in one case in the air. Likewise modest,'" said Su.

"For a daughter used to flying steerage, one time through the doors of the sleek, tiny, cigar tube into the body of Concorde, I knew I had entered into the rarified air of gods and kings. Just dang, things were small and cramped. Leather, polish and flutes of never-ending Champagne, merely really squished.

"Simply hey, three and a half hours to Paris? I sucked it up," chuckles Marshall.

Supersonic makeover

Concorde at Aerospace Bristol

"The quality and fashion of food service was exceptional."

Suzanne Plunkett/CNN

In the 1980s, Richard Ford was on the team at Landor Assembly charged with updating Concorde'due south interior for British Airways.

"Equally a part of the detailed technical work information technology was important to acquire more about the flying experience. I was privileged to exist offered the hazard to brand a return flight to New York from London in 1 day!" says Ford.

"Despite its small size it felt more like an executive jet than a commercial airliner, with thrilling performance," he adds.

"The quality and fashion of food service was exceptional, and I left with a signed document equally evidence of my flight."

To meet with an important client some years afterward, Ford flew Concorde one more time, but as a fare-paying passenger.

"I felt more strongly that I had entered a individual lodge. It was a brief glimpse into a life I had non known, polite, considerate, and beautifully detailed. Information technology was incommunicable to non feel spoiled, and valued," says Ford.

Mid-century curiosity

Concorde interior details

Concorde was the first -- and still only -- passenger aircraft that had turbojet engines with afterburners.

Suzanne Plunkett/CNN

Concorde was developed at a time when the aviation industry was focused on supersonic airline travel.

In the early 1960s, aeronautical engineers didn't accept today's blueprint and analysis tools. But Concorde's designers came upward with a remarkably advanced and unique aircraft.

Concorde was the first -- and nevertheless only -- rider aircraft that had turbojet engines with afterburners. Chosen "reheat" by the British, raw fuel was introduced into the frazzle of the plane'due south four engines, immediately increasing the engines' thrust by almost 20%.

"Concorde was vastly different from subsonic shipping at the time. It had no flaps or slats (loftier-lift devices on the fly) and always used full power with reheat for takeoff," explains former British Airways Concorde captain John Tye.

"Each takeoff was a phenomenal feel, the performance such that nosotros had to warn the passengers in advance what to expect. The roar of the Rolls-Royce Olympus engines, combined with being pushed back into your seat, was similar no other civilian aeroplane."

Reheat was also used to push the plane from subsonic to supersonic speeds.

Cruising at Mach 2 -- or ane,350 mph -- at lx,000 feet, Concorde flew five miles above and 800 mph faster than the subsonic 747s plodding across the Atlantic.

The radio chatter between aircraft could get interesting, according to Tye. "We would often warn these slower shipping nosotros were coming by in case the sonic boom alarmed them, as we shot by faster than a rifle bullet."

Finish of an era

Concorde at Aerospace Bristol

Passengers and coiffure on Concorde's final flight left their mark on the airplane.

Suzanne Plunkett/CNN

By 1976, social pressure over concerns with the plane'south noise and sonic boom led to the cancellation of virtually all orders for Concorde, leaving British Airways and Air France as the merely airlines to fly the SST.

The aeroplane suffered its just blow in July 2000 when an Air French republic Concorde crashed but after takeoff from Paris, killing all 109 people on board and four on the footing.

Concorde returned to service in November 2001, just age, and increasing operating and overhaul costs, caught up with the planes after almost xxx years in the air.

Richard Quest flew on the final, celebrity-studded British Airways Concorde flight in October 2003.

Of that flight, Quest says: "It didn't thing how famous yous were, the star was the plane."

Visiting Concorde

Concorde at Aerospace Bristol

Concorde at Aerospace Bristol.

Suzanne Plunkett/CNN

While Concorde no longer takes to the skies, it can be visited at a number of aviation museums around the world. Here are some of the best:

Aerospace Bristol (Great britain) -- A hugely enjoyable new museum built effectually the Alpha Foxtrot, the terminal Concorde always to fly. The museum, close to the aircraft mill where Concorde was adult, explores the UK'due south aviation industry. (Hayes Mode, Patchway, Bristol BS34 5BZ; +44 117 931 5315)

Museum Air and Space Paris Le Bourget (French republic) -- Stellar aeronautical museum near Paris that covers the history of manned flying from wooden planes to space rockets and contains ii Concordes, including the outset always to take flying. (Aéroport de Paris-Le Bourget, 93350 Le Bourget; +33 one 49 92 70 00)

Intrepid Body of water, Air & Space Museum (New York) -- Leviathans of air, sea and space come together at this destination museum overlooking the Hudson River. British Airways Concorde Alpha Delta joins a roster that includes Infinite Shuttle Enterprise, aircraft carrier Intrepid and submarine Growler. (Pier 86, Westward 46th St & 12th Ave, New York; +01 212-245-0072)

Motorcar & Technik Museum Sinsheim (Frg) -- Marvels of motor technology through the ages are the focus of this crammed museum virtually Frankfurt. The Concorde takes pride of identify with ane of the other pinnacles of recent transport history -- a Delorean DMC-12.

The Museum of Flight (Seattle) -- Billing itself every bit the largest contained, not-profit air and space museum in the world, the Museum of Flying is abode to British Airways Concorde Alpha Golf, likewise as the starting time always Boeing 747. (9404 East. Marginal Way, Seattle, WA 98108; 206-764-5700).