Why did Concorde technology never become popular?

Question

Concorde was the fastest and most successful passenger plane ever constructed. People flying in Concorde can reach their destination in half the time.

Yet, why is it the practice of supersonic flying never really took off? Why is it Boeing or Airbus still use slower planes? Why did Concorde technology stayed where it is?

Answer 1

Concorde failed for two reasons: it couldn't cross the Pacific and the Americans didn't like it. Well, the latter is a little unfair, since many in the US rightly objected to the truly stupendous racket the thing made wherever it went. It's hard to see how Boeing will address these issues and others which did not exist when Concorde was designed, such as jet exhaust destruction of the ozone layer.

Airbus Industries is well on the way to delivering the Airbus A380 Super Jumbo, a 555-passenger double-decker. This behemoth may be conventional in its design, but here's how it will, according to Airbus, redefine the air transport paradigm: "Offering about a third more seating and far more available floor space than its closest competitor, the A380 will deliver an unparalleled level of comfort, with wider seats and aisles, open spaces for passengers to stretch their legs and access to lower-deck amenities."

This is, of course, complete nonsense. The first thing operators will do is rip out the planned "leisure areas" (which include a gym, no less) and fill the space so created with more seats and fill the space between the seats with more surly and obstreperous flight attendants and keep you waiting for three hours at the airport while security ensure that you are able to enjoy this unique flying experience in comfort and safety.

As noted, the A380 is nothing more than a very big jet. Boeing is countering the Airbus challenge with a rather more futuristic Sonic Cruiser. It's designed to carry 200-250 passengers at Mach 0.95 to 0.98, and is presumably aimed at the Concorde market for fast intercontinental business travel.

I sorely miss concorde, i used to live in SW london and at the same time everyday , depending on wind direction, you would see and hear concorde take off and it was a sight to behold and the noise was spine tingling..

Answer 2

Concorde wasn't the most successful jet by any stretch of the economic imagination.

It wasn't successful because , the US banned it from flying supersonic over the continental US which meant that it would have been pointless for the major US airlines Pan-Am and TWA to have bought the aircraft to offer 3 hour New York to Los Angeles flights. They took this action because Boeing was developing an SST at the time and the UK/French consortium was years ahead of them. There was a very vocal minority lobby which the US government hid behind and used as an excuse to introduce the ban.

This lead to the US airlines cancelling orders. Combined with the oil crisis in the early 70s many other airlines cancelled orders too. Thought it's range was limited, it could land, re-fuel and take off very quickly - right up until the services were stopped, BAs winter flights to Barbados re-fueled in Lisbon or Shannon. Concorde also made it to sydney via 2 stop overs and still made it in record time...

In hindsight it's very easy to sit here now and say what would have been. If concorde had been more successful in terms of more of them flying, modern aviation would be a very different thing now.

On another note, though the TU144 was larger (marginally) it would have been and still will be extremely difficult to make anything much larger than concorde was that can fly as fast as it did. Boeing are only playing with the idea in order to keep Airbus guessing. For example their initial co-operation with Airbus on investigating VLA - very large aircrat and then pulling out when Airbus decided to go ahead and only ever really canned their project when initial delays on the A380 set in about 4 years ago.

Personally, why any airline chooses to fly 40 year old technology with outdated, inefficient designs and doesn't make Boeing introduce something new is beyond me.

Though the Airbus has had teething problems, people forget that so did the 747, 707, DC10 and plenty of other aircraft.

Rant over ;-)

Answer 3

Good answer David C., and in most respects I agree, with one small difference.

I was very aware of the development of Concord from the very beginning, and was the proud recipient of a great deal of data on the soon-to-be test flown pre-production prototype.

I was also aware that, at that time in the early 60's, Boeing was heavily into it's version which was code-named the SST ( cunning that - Super Sonic Transport ). The board of Boeing was in some disarray over some awesome cost over-runs, but all the while kept in check by the belief that they would first into the market. Also their 'bird' was quite a lot bigger, and thus commercially more viable.

Well, we all know what happened, the Anglo-French consortium started test flights at Fairford while Boeing was still on the drawing board, and not making much headway. The project was scrapped and large amount of hubrus and downright sour grapes poured forth from the Septic side of the pond.

The campaign kicked off in New York, with Kennedy ( the former Idlewild ) banning Concorde flights, due to noise. There is no question that she does make a hell of a racket , particularly on take off, but she is still the most beautiful and inspiring commercial passenger transport ever built.

And.............just to the entire waffle of my chest......I have often wondered what the real effect of Marcel Dassault's major share-holding in Boeing might have had to do with the whole yarn ???

The final word on supersonic passenger flights ? Maybe it will be a HOTOL or similar that will eventually provide a realistic way to pop us from London to Sydney in a couple of hours or so. If they can de-bug plasma drive, or come up with some other non-dinosaur burning propulsion system that is environmentally sane, then it could be on the cards.

It should also be remembered that the technology that brought us Concorde also, like the NASA space program, brought an extraordinary array of advances in many other fields.

Answer 4

It may have been the fastest, but it certainly was not the most successful. It could not fly supersonic over anything but the ocean because the sonic booms are annoying and sometimes destructive. It was too expensive for the vast majority of travelers, and too high-maintenance. It could not land or take off from the majority of the world's airports because of its speed and special requirements. There were very few Concordes built, and their routes and flight frequency were so limited that most people couldn't get where they wanted to go when they wanted to go even if they could afford a ticket. Basically, the people have spoken. We have said loud and clear that we are not interested in hypersonic air travel. We are interested in convenience. It all comes down to money. If there were any money in hauling people all over the world at mach 1, the skies would be black with Concordes, SSTs, and TU-144s. Since you know so much about supersonic passenger aircraft, I shouldn't have to explain the significance of those three names.

Answer 5

The Concorde never made it into the business well financially. It had a high operation cost for the airline and the airports it used to fly had to be full equipped and have a longer runway. In addition to that supersonics also cause noise pollution.

Answer 6

the technology is there...look at supersonic jets

as for concorde....airbus, air france and british airways all say that it is not economically viable to maintain and operate anymore. this is debatable but they know best having had first had experience of operating the aircraft.

Answer 7

since concode has a slender fuselage the passanger carrying capacity is very low when compared to a's and b's.so no airlines will come forward to buy those planes.. airlines will aim at carrying more passengers in a single flight and the profit they get from it.......supersonic planes don't give that much profit so the tech' was not made popular.....even in concorde the passengers boarding aflight was very lesss,due to high fares.......



the reason for slender body is to reduce drag and to reduce aerodynamic loading on it during supersonic flights.....

Answer 8

They claimed that plane never turned a profit in fact they say it lost money I don't know why because people were on a waiting list that didn't mind paying a premium fee to fly, My self I feel it was the greatest passenger plane of all times.

Answer 9

To be a nerdy tech head, the Tupelov TU-144 was bigger and faster, but USSR's flimsy economy ultimately failed it.

The problem primarily is that the faster you go, the more power you need and the rise is exponential, so to jump from 500mph to 1000mph doesn't need double the power, it needs about 10 times the power.

This ultimately means you chew through fuel at an astronimcal rate, which is why it costed so much to fly on it.

Answer 10

The concept was never finacially successful. The technology cost far too much, the fuel consumtion was too high and most airport's runways were too short to handle the needs of the aircraft.