Posts about: "JFK" [Posts: 82 Pages: 5]

OK, I see others have already posted answers.
I've carefully avoided looking at them, but I'll might as well plug in mine now.

My personal problem is that I was involved in the very earliest days, before the aircraft went into service, and then in the last days and afterwards...
So the questions dealing with the in-service period are totally outside my field of experience... all I can do is guess, in case I saw the answers somewhere.

1) How many Concorde airframes were built?
Twenty-two.
Two static-test airframes.
- One at Toulouse, for purely static tests, and tests such as vibration and flutter.
- One at Farnborough, for the long-duration thermal fatigue tests.
(A few bits and pieces of the Farnborough test specimen have survived, and can still be seen at the Brooklands museum).
Two prototypes (001 and 002)
Two pre-production aircraft (01 and 02)
Two production aircraft used for certification, that never entered service (201 - F-WTSB and 202 - G-BBDG)
Fourteen production aircraft, seven that served with British Airways, seven that served with Air France.

2) As far as the British constructed aircraft went, name the destinations that were served?. Regular flight numbers only, excludes charters etc.
Not a clue as to the full list.
- Bahrain, obviously.
- JFK.
- IAD (not sure if that's rated as regular, or only incidental)
- Dallas (with Braniff)
- Barbados (of course, right until the end)
- Sngapore (with Singapore Airlines, and G-BOAD in Singapore Airlines colours on one side)
- Sydney (again no idea if that rated as a regular flight or only a few tries)

3) What was the departure time for the ORIGINAL morning LHR-JFK Concorde services? (Not called the BA001 then either).
Not a clue either. Vague memory of about 10:00 am which gave you a full working day in New York.

4) Further to question 3 above, what WERE the original flight numbers for the BA001 and BA003? (The morning and evening LHR-JFK services?)..
Never flew on them, never had to deal with them.
BA174 comes to mind from the depths of my memory, in that case BA003 would have been BA176?

5) There were no less than FORTY SIX fuel pumps on Concorde. What was the breakdown for these? (Clue; don't forget the scavenge pump )
M2dude, I did AFCS, not the fuel system. I believe you, but without pulling out some diagrams I honestly have NO idea.
I expect each tank had at least two pumps, which gets me up to 26.
Then there were a few emergency pumps for the trim tanks, and I suppose each engine had additional pumps associated with it.
Still nowhere near the 46 I need to find.....

6) What airframe had the only TOTALLY unique shape?
That would have been my old friend, 01 (G-AXDN), first pre-production aircraft, now at Duxford.
It was the first Concorde with the new transparent visor, but it still had the short tail that characterised the prototypes.
It was 02 (F-WTSA), the first French pre-production aircraft, that was close to the final shape of the production aircraft.

7) This one is particularly aimed at ChristiaanJ. What was the total number of gyros on the aircraft?
Good question.... never counted them all. But I'll try a guess.
First a nice one, the SFENA Emergency Standby Artificial Horizon (made by the firm I worked for).
Ran off the Emergency Battery Bus via a small independent inverter.
And if that failed too, it would still run reliably for several minutes on its own inertia.
Next, the rate gyros used by the autostabilisation system ; these measured the angular rate of the aircraft along the three main axes, pitch, roll and yaw.
There were six, three each for the two autostab systems.
Now the rest....
Each IMU (inertial measurement unit, part of the inertial naviagation system) had three gyros.
With three INS on board, that would make nine.
Much as I try, I can't remember other ones, so I'll look forward to the final answer.
I can imagine the weather radar using an additional gyro for stabilisation, but I never went there.

8) How many wheel brakes?
Unless this is a trick question, I would say eight, for each of the main gear wheels.
The nose gear did not have any brakes - unless there were some small ones to stop the wheels rotating after retraction of the gear, but not used during landing.

9) What Mach number was automatic engine variable intake control enabled?
No idea.
Mach 1.0 or thereabouts is my personal guess only.

10) Above each bank of engine instruments were three lights, a blue, a green and an amber. What did they each signify?
I know that they each monitored the status of one of the engines, because it was too complex for the pilots to fully monitor all the parameters of all four engines in the short time between start-of-roll and V1... they had too many other things to do.
But I don't remember what each light meant, would have to look it up in the manual.

11) At what airfied were the first BA crew base training details held?
No idea.
Was it Brize Norton, or Casablanca?

12) What LHR runways did Concorde use for landing and take-off? (Trick question, not as obvious as it might seem).
No idea.
Vague memory of it being systematically the North runway for noise issues.

13) What operator had serious plans to operate Concorde from SNN to JFK in the early 1980's?
No idea.

14) What development aircraft did not exceed Mach 2 until fifteen months after her maiden flight?
I would expect the obvious answer to be 002.
Working up from first flight to Mach 2 was a slow and laborious process, and in the end it was 001 that both flew first, and also went to Mach 2 first.
I don't think any of the other aircraft took that long.

A I said, I tried to answer all questions "off the top of my head", without looking at any other sources.

CJ

OK guys, here are the answers. If you disagree about any of them then fire away, the old memory certainly 'aint perfect.
As many of you have guessed, there were 22: The 14 production airframes, the 2 production series development aircraft (201 & 202), the 2 pre-production airframes (101 & 102) and the 2 prototypes 001 & 002. PLUS, the major fatigue test specimen at the RAE Farnborough and the static test specimen at CEAT in Toulouse. The CEAT tests actually tested the wing to destruction; I seem to remember it was something like a 200% overload before the wing failed at the root. And great but rather sad pictures VOLUME , never seen these before.
OK, from MY memory , we have: London LHR (duhhh!!), Bahrein BAH, Singapore SIN, New York JFK, Washington IAD, Dallas DFW, Miami MIA, Toronto YYZ, Barbados BGI, and Riyadh RUH. As well as charters being ommited, so are some of the special 'surprise' shuttle appearances that Concorde would make, substituting a subsonic to and from destinations such as Manchester and Edinburgh.
11:15
The BA193 and BA 195.
OK, there were 12 engine feed pumps (3 per engine) 8 main transfer tank pumps (2 each for the transfer tanks 5, 6, 7 & 8), 4 'A' tank pumps (2 each for 5A & 7A), 8 trim-transfer tank pumps (2 electric pumps each for tanks 9, 10 & 11 PLUS 2 hydraulically driven pumps for tank 9), 4 electric engine start pumps (there was a single electric start pump per engine that delivered fuel to it's own dedicated start atomiser in the combustion chamber. The pump automatically ran when the engine HP valve was set to OPEN and would continue running for 30 seconds after the DEBOW switch was returned to the 'normal' position), 4 engine first stage pumps (a single mechanically driven pump per engine), 4 second stage pumps (a single pneumatically driven pump, sometimes termed 'the turbopump, per engine. This would cut out at around 20,000'), our scavenge tank pump (triggered automatically when there was 7 US gallons in the tank; pumping it back into tank 2. This pump was identical to an 'A' tank transfer pump), and FINALLY, a single de-air pump for tank 10. The pump would drive the fuel through a mesh, removing air bubbles from the fuel. Tank 11 used the L/H trim pump for de-air (similar principle)and would be switched on during take-off. This is why the tank 5 trim inlet valve being set to over-ride OPEN would result in the tank being highly pressurised in the case of the Gonesse disaster; the pump would obviously pressurise the L/H trim gallery and any tank on that side with an open inlet valve!!!
G-AXDN, aircraft 101. (A production wing, fuselage, droop nose and intakes, but with the short tail section and secondary nozzles of the prototypes.
Ready ChristiaanJ? There were 18....Yes, the single SFENA standby horizon, 9 INS gyros (one per X,Y and Z platform in each of the 3 INUs), 8 autostab' rate gyros (one per axis for each of the 2 autostab' computers PLUS a monitor gyro for the pitch axis). The radar by the way used attitude signals from the INS.
9. One per main wheel plus the single 'in flight braking' nose wheel brake.
Mach 0.7!!! Between this and Mach 1.26 the intake surfaces were positioned as a function of engine N1 if the engine was shut down for any reason. (Otherwise of course the intake surfaces were fully up). You needed a sub idle N1 of 57% and below for all this to happen, and it was to assist relight performance and reduce buffet. Between Mach 1.26 and 1.32 the ramps were driven down slightly to about 5%, full supersonic scheduling itself commencing at Mach 1.32.
Already brilliantly answered by Brit312 (as well as the FSLabs diagram). Yep, Geen GO, T/O monitor armed, fuel flow and P7 at or above datum, A/C on ground, reverse not selected and CON light not on. Amber CON (Reheat selected and not detected, N1 OK or reverse selected and primary nozzle (Aj) not at minimum. Blue REV; steady buckets at reverse, flashing buckets in transit.
Fairford, followed by Brize Norton, and then a host of airfields from Prestwick and Shannon to Chateauroux.
OK, probably no surprises now:
Landing - 27L & R, 9L & R (prior to LHR mag' deviation update were 28L & R & 10L & R) together with 23/05.
Take off - 27L (28L), 9R (10R) and 9L. (10L never happened as take offs on this runway only occurred in 2003).
It was FedEx, they planned to operate two stripped out aircraft, leased from BA, between Shannon and JFK as high value parcel carriers. The idea was that parcels would be flown in from all over Europe by small FedEx feeder aircraft and the parcels transferred to Concorde which would then speed on to JFK in around 2 1/2 hours. It never happened because of a combination of economics appraisal by FedEx and BA deciding that it could would not release the aircraft anyway.
A/C 101, G-AXDN first flew on 17th December 1971 with FIXED INTAKES!! (101 was going to be the launch vehicle for the new digital intake control system, but the 'boxes' were still being designed). This placed an operating limit of Mach 1.5 on the aircraft, limiting her ability with such a restricted flight envelope. She returned to Filton in late 1972 for installation of the system, as well as the new Olympus 593-602 engine. (The engine, very similar to the production Mk 610 version, used a quite revolutionary annular combustion chamber, and eliminated at a stroke the thick smoke exhaust that had up to then been Concorde's unwanted visual signiture). The aircraft flew more or less smokeless on 15 March 1973, achieving Mach 2 soon afterwards. As ChristiaanJ pointed out, the British prototype 002 had a similar gap, actually significantly higher, of 19 months. (The French aircraft 001 had an even longer gap of some 20 months).

I hope you guys had fun with this one, regards to all

Dude

jodelistie
First of all Rod, welcome to our Concorde thread, and thank you very much for your kind words.
Now as far as the rumour goes, I'm afraid that it is nonsense, however the truth is an even more complex story of collusion, betrayal and intrigue. You may read that 'Concorde was retired by BA and Air France purely due to economic reasons', however that is not quite the case (and as far as THIS side of the English Puddle goes, is total poppycock!!). Now BA lost a huge amount of her regular traffic as a result of the 9/11 tragedy and also as a result of the 2003 Iraq war, but things were improving nicely. In her 27 years of operation, Concorde had survived countless dips in her traffic, only to return stronger as market conditions improved.
It is early 2003, and French Concorde traffic to the USA has almost vanished, down to single digit loads. This is due mainly to total French opposition the impending US/UK invasion of Iraq, and US businessmen using BA Concorde almost exclusively. (French business seems to be boycotting the US altogether, so their contribution to passenger loads virtually ceased). Due to the apalling loads, AF are losing absolutely MILLIONS of Euros, at a time when the carrier is trying to privatise itself ... but there is more:
In the same February, AF very nearly lost ANOTHER Concorde, yet again largely down to total incompetence and lack of adherence to established procedures. Aircraft F-BTSD was flying between CDG and JFK when there was a failure of the reheat delivery pipe that runs from the engine 1st stage fuel pump to the reheat shut-off valve. This failure, although not particularly serious, led to a chain of events that very nearly resulted in the loss of the aircraft, and all those onboard. (Air France engines were overhauled seperately to BA, who never experienced this particular failure). What was required in the case of this failure was a precautionary engine shut-down, closing off the fuel supply to the engine totally, and a descent/deceleration to subsonic speed, carefully monitoring fuel consumption all the time. Unfortunately the crew 'forgot' to shut down the fuel LP valve, and this resulted in the fuel continuing to gush out of the failed pipe at an alarming rate. (Oh, and also they forgot to monitor the fuel consumption). Only after the crew FINALLY noticed that they were still losing fuel did they remember to close the engine LP valve, but it was almost too late. The aircraft just managed to land in Halifax, with barely enough fuel left in the tanks to taxi!! So, herer we are, AF are horrified that they have come very close to yet another disaster, knowing full well that yet again human error was a major factor.
But there is more....
One week later another AF aircraft loses part of a rudder panel due to de-lamination of the honeycomb surface, not particularly serious in itself, but it put even more jitters up the trousers of AF. (Rudder failures had happened to BA aircraft many years previous to this, but BA had purchased brand new and improved rudders from Airbus UK in Filton, but Air France chose not too).
So it seems that the chairmen of both Air France and Airbus (who regards Concorde as a waste of its valuable resources) have a 'secret' meeting to plan what was effectively the murder of Concorde. There is no way that AF want BA to carry on flying Concorde while they have to cease operations, so the plan is for Airbus to make a huge hike in their product support costs; these costs would have to be borne by BA exclusively, which they both knew would not be possible. If these support costs were not met, there would be no manufacturers support, and without this there would be no type certificate, and without this, no more Concorde.
Their (AF & Airbus) hope was that BA would not challenge this move legally, and sadly for the world of aviation they did not. At a meeting, BA AND AIR FRANCE!!!! were told by Airbus about the hike in product support costs, and BA would also have to cease operations. BA were not even allowed to continue until March 2004 (the Barbados season was nearly fully booked already), and so would have to cease operations in October 2003.
But the British were far from blameless in all this; a now retired very senior British airline person had always obsessively HATED Concorde, so the French conspiracy was a very early Christmas present for him; he finally got what he had always wanted. The 'end of Concorde' anouncement by both airlines was made in April 2003; AF had got what their executives wanted and finished flying in May, reluctantly leaving BA to fly until late October. If you want a full (and extremely well informed) explanation of what happened in that whole debacle, the article by Don Pevsner is worth reading. It can be found at this website:
THE BETRAYAL OF CONCORDE
There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that without the truly disgusting events in France in early 2003, Concorde would still be proudly flying for BA. (And with modifications and enhancements would fly safely for many more years).
quote** "in the hands of true professionals, Concorde was the safest aircraft that ever flew. and in the hands of BA crews at least, she was always just that..*

Oh and yes you were correct, the Olympus (the world's first ever 2 spool engine) was originally a 'Bristol-Siddeley' design, before BS were absorbed into Rolls-Royce. Stanley Hookers book is in my view totally superb, a true classic.

Dude

I have to admit that some of the subsonic fuel burn figures for Concorde were truly eye watering, and without massive engine and airframe modifications there was precious little in service that could be done to improve things. Paradoxically improvements to the supersonic efficiency of the powerplant were easier to implement, and several modifications were implemented, tried or proposed to improve fuel burn:
Way back in the late 1970's we did a major modification to the intakes that increased capture area by 2.5% and gave us typically a 1.6% improvement in trans-Atlantic fuel burn, and although this was our biggest performance improvement modification, there were more:
The famous elevon and rudder trailing edge extension modifications (that due to poor design, produced in later life the water ingress induced honeycomb failures) together with the re-profiled fin leading edge modification, I never saw the performance gains quantified (anyone have any ideas?).
Can anyone here remember the riblet trial? In the mid 1990's Airbus supplied 'stick on' plastic riblets, applied to various areas on the under-side of the wing on G-BOAG. These riblets had very fine undulations moulded into the surface; the idea being that as the air flowed through and around the riblet patches, boundary layer turbulence, and hence induced drag would be reduced. Now, the performance gains (if any) were never quantified, mainly because the riblet patches either peeled off or the surface deteriorated with the continuous thermal cycle. (I was over in JFK when the aircraft first arrived after having the riblets fitted, and as the crew were trying to proudly show me these amazing aerodynamic devices, they were sadly embarassed, as several had dissapeared in the course of a single flight).
There was one modification, proposed by Rolls Royce in the late 1990's that did have quite a lot of potential; this was to increase the engine N1 by around 1.5%. This would have had the effect of increasing engine mass flow and therefore reducing the drag inducing spill of supersonic air over the lower lip of the intake. Depending on the temperature, the performance gains were in the order of a 1.5% improvement in fuel burn at ISA Plus upper atmosphere temperatures ('normal' LHR-JFK) to none at all at significant ISA Minus temperatures (LHR -BGI). The modifacation had been trialed on G-BBDG before her retirement in the early eighties, and was proven in terms of performance enhancement and engine stability. In order to keep TET at the pre-modification level, there was a small increase in N2 commanded also. (The higher N1 required an increase in primary nozzle area, reducing TET). The main reason for the modification not being implemented was one of cost; The Ultra Electronics Engine Control Units were analog units, and the modification was a simple replacement of two resistors per unit. However because ultimate mass flow limitation was also controll by the digital AICU (built by British Aerospace Guided Weapons Division) the cost of getting a software update for this exremely 'mature' unit was found to be prohibitive.
A certain 'brainy' SEO and myself were working on a modification to improve fuel burn on ISA minus sectors. The idea was to force the autopilot, in Max Cruise at low temperatures only , to fly the aircraft close to Mmo, rather than at Max Cruise speed of Mach 2 - 2.02; this would have given us gains of up to 1%, depending on the temperature. The basic electronics involved for the modification were relatively straightforward, but it was never pursued due to the complexity of dealing with temperature shears and the cost of certification.

Dude

Landroger
It always was a bit of a paradox; in terms of fuel price and environmental concerns, Concorde was about 5 years too late. But in ELECTRONICS terms she was 10 years too early. Bearing in mind that the first Intel 4004 was not even commercially available until 1971. When the decision was taken in late 1970 to 're-design' the analog air intake control system into a digital one, there was nothing to fall back on; a BAC custom guided missile processor (used I believe on both the Rapier and Sea Dart SAMs) had to be adapted. This processor was, as I've yawned on about before, comprised of multiple double sided PCBs completely stacked with TTL ICs. In spite of being a total antique and a dinasore (just like me ) this thing was really cutting edge technology at the time, even using a 64 bit data word. The AICS as again I've yawned on about before, was the WORLD's first commercial airborne digital control sysstem, but the Concorde analog stuff in fact worked pretty well indeed.

Galaxy Flyer
As always GF you make your point really well. As far as Concorde went, the very few American (Branniff) pilots who flew her thought she was totally amazing, and the American BA engineers at JFK and IAD absolutely adored the aeroplane.
And back to your 'charriot', the C5 has been a staggeringly successful aeroplane in terms of US service. and is still thriving (big modernisation programme underway). Not bad for an aircraft that entered USAF service in 1969!!!
Regards

Dude

M2 Dude

Back in August of 1997 I had the privilege of a ride in G-BOAC out of CYYZ on a flight to now where ie east of JFK up to FL550 Mach 2.0 etc.
It was back in a gentler day with a visit to the flight deck and I can still remember it all is if it was yesterday. As you can tell by web name I am industry and I really appreciated the short time I had in the Flight Deck. Unfortuneatly I was one of 99 that day so I did not get a chance to ask all the questions but the fuel system and fuel pump mini lecture from the flight engineer was stunning.
Please accept my sincere thank you and to Christian as well.
Like the Avro Arrow the TSR-2 the Concorde will live long in our minds.
One last comment many years ago we were number 2 on 09R in LHR and Concorde takes off in front of us. We were in an L-1011 that day and it shook as if a metal saw was trying to cut us in two. The Flight Service Director came running in white as a ghost and his first words were "What the #@&*" was that.........................
Please keep writing your story and if I ever run across you on the other side of the "pond" the bitter is on me

I remember once decending into JFK, still at about M1.7ish on the 001 and the 002 was climbing out having just accelerated. Through disruption to schedules (this would not usually happen) the AF pair were in the same state (one in, one out, both supersonic). I asked the controller (I *think* it was NY centre) if that was the first time he'd ever had four supersonic airliners, simultaneously, on his watch - the reply was effusive and summed up the really positive reaction that aeroplane engendered in people working with it in any field...

ChristiaanJ
There is THIS link from Gordon Roxborough's superb 'ConncordeSST site' CONCORDE SST : 10th Anniversary
As you can see the event occured on Christmas Eve in 1985. As you can see from the video, Capt John Hutchinson was also aboard G-BOAG as a commentator, the F/O being John 'Noj' White. (After leaving the fleet when he got his command, Noj eventually returned to Concorde many years later as Capt Noj).
At the bottom of the web page I am 99% sure that Gordon got it wrong when he said that the reason that there were only 6 aircraft for the Boxing day 'group photo' was that the seventh aircraft was in the paint shop. I was there when we did the photo shoot, and I am pretty sure the only reason we never had aircraft 7 was that it was in JFK.

CAAAD
I wouldn't be at all surprised (the Ultra ECA was a real steam powered piece of kit) but we always managed to get obsolete/obsolescent electron component somewhow. I remember when we test flew the Plessey (I think) digital ECA on G-BBDG in the late 1970's it was a fraction of the size, ran cooler and the engine parameters were more stable too. Such a pity that we never went down that road for the production aircraft.

Regards
Dude

VApilot2004
This really is a sad state of afairs I know. G-BOAD even had the 'radome tore off and the droop nose bent sideways by an idiot of a truck driver when she was stored in New Jersey 18 months or so ago. A new 'radome' was fabricated out of fibreglass (quite a reasonable attempt actually) and the bent nose? A hammer and blowtorch fixed that!! (I'm not joking). I have American engineer friends at JFK who can not even bring themselves to look at what Alpha Delta has become. They used to take exquisite care of Concorde during JFK transits, and to see her now, well it's just too much for those guys. (This is another personal one for me I'm afraid, G-BOAD was the first Concorde I ever flew on, November 5th 1976 out of Fairford).

Regards
Dude

Just a short video clip of G-BOAE arriving JFK in June 2000

concorde

Hi Guys, quite a few little points here, so here's my angle(s):
Pedalz
Ooo yes. The biggest problems we ever had associated with the ramps themselves were wear in the seals at the sides of the forward ramp. Even a few thou' over the maximum allowable side gap was enough to make the intake unstable and susceptible to surging. (It is quite interesting that the rear ramp side gaps were not in the least bit critical, and if Concorde intake development had continued, the rear ramps were going to be deleted altogether). Other failure factors were control unit malfuntions, rapid sensor drift; all of these causing either ramp/spill door drift or runaway. Primary nozzle misbehaviour could also result in intake surges. Having said all that, the monitoring of the intake system was truly superb, and surface runaways, themselves quite rare, would usually be picked up by the control system monitors causing either a lane switch or if that did not work, a total 'red light' failure with the surfaces frozen. No surge was treated as 'just one of those things', and much midnight oil was burned and hair pulled out (so that's what happened to mine ) to try and find the cause of the surge.
My friend EXWOK perfectly answered the intake hydraulics allocations.
EXWOK was right on the ball here as usual, in fact above Mach 1.6 an interactive surge was more or less guaranteed. The cause of interactive surge had nothing to do with the wing leading edge position, but to the radially generated distortion field coming out of the FRONT of the surging intake, severely distorting the adjascent intakes airflow. It mattered not if the originating surge was an inboard or an outboard intake, the other guy would always go also, above Mach 1.6.
You might want to take a look at 'When Intakes Go Wrong Part 1:
Concorde engine intake "Thrust"
and Parts 2 & 3:
Concorde engine intake "Thrust"
Not to mention Part 3:


dixi188
I can never recall this particular event happening with BA , certainly not as a result of a ramp failure. Although in the near 28 years of operation we had quite a few SNN diversions, none that I can ever recall were as the result of a ramp structural failure. The two major SNN diversions that I can recall were G-BOAF in the early 80s when an LP1 blade failed and resulted in a totally wrecked engine (although a completely contained failure) and G-BOAA in 1991, with another wrecked engine due to running in rotating stall. (Both of these events were covered previously in our thread). ChristiaanJ has mentioned quite rightly the event with A/C 001 spitting a ramp out, and Air France had a ramp failure going into JFK. (Covered previously in our thread, due to certain 'human foul ups'). I am not sure, but I think that this one in JFK DID require a double engine change in JFK. (Usually from SNN a BA aircraft would be 3 engine ferried back to LHR).

ChristiaanJ
Nope, you are quite right, no more French or British development aircraft ever suffered a ramp linkage failure again. The 001 ramp failure was a salutary lesson to the design team, and the intake assembly became tougher than old boots after that, nomatter WHAT you threw at it.


Due to the lateness of the hour (and me being up at 4 ), that will have to do for now guys.

Best regards to all
Dude

Nick Thomas
Jeepers Nick, I must have about a million, but I'd like to share a few here. (Some of them I have prattled on about before in this thread, so I apologise for any repetitions).I suppose my very FIRST Concorde image would have to be in Swindon in 1970, when I was this young RAF 'erk' at nearby RAF Lyneham; I heard this loud roar in the sky over what is now Debenhams, and looked up and saw for the very first time Concorde 002, along with her attendant Canberra chase plane.
My next memorable image was at Fairford in the summer 1974. (No longer a young RAF erk, but a still fairly young lad now working for BAC). I'd seen quite a few spectacular take-offs in my short time at BAC, but A/C 101 (G-AXDN) was being flown by a French DGAC pilot (I forget the gentleman's name I'm afraid) and did the most amazing of take-offs. It was the clearest of blue summer skies, and this guy rotated 101 and just climbed steeply into the Gloucestershire sky, and climbed and climbed until she was virtually out of view; truly memorable.
Another image that I will never forget is the view of Concorde taking off from JFK RW31L, viewed from the right side of the runway sat in a truck (I did this dozens of times and never tired of watching the spectacle). It always amazed me how ANY airliner could turn and climb that amazing fashion, and would try and keep her in view as she did an almost complete circuit around JFK. (But I found the view from the aircraft, when seated in the supernumerary seat just behind the captain even more amazing. You'd looked out of the rear L/H window and see nothing but the water of Jamaica Bay going by, very fast and VERY close).
Another GREAT image was in 1995; on a special test flight on-board G-BOAD out of LHR. I was sat on the flight deck with the three guys (just us four on the whole aeroplane) and we were positioned just aft and to the left of the BA189 Concorde service to IAD. We started the supersonic acceleration together, but as we peeled off south for our extensive test flight, the BA189 (can't remember for the life of me the registration) just seemed to streak ahead just like the Starship Enterprise, and was out of sight completely quite soon after that.
And I shall never forget the very sad view of the last ever Concorde take-off, watching from the side of Heathrow RW 27R in November 2003. OAF took off with all her usual grace, but symbolically just disappeared into the overcast, dark and gloomy sky. My own final personal image after 33 years of watching Concorde is that the aviation world, just like that November sky, is a far gloomier place without her.

Best regards
Dude

In you'll indulge me in another question that's been on my mind recently! Watched & read various things about the noise monitoring on Concorde's flight out of JFK in order for her to be able to fly in & out at the start of her service life.

Obviously a very inventive solution was practiced and executed which resulted in the noise monitors registering no problem whatsoever - indeed, people wondering why on earth no other aircraft doing the same procedure.

However, my question is this - What if she hadn't done this procedure? Would she have been too loud for the noise monitors? Was it actually necessary to perform the procedure? Politically it was a great idea, and no possibility of failure could be allowed at the time. But was she actually too loud in reality for the JFK noise monitors?

- Davva

Short answer: Yes. The procedures were necessary.

Even using them, it didn't take much to generate a noise fine (e.g. on a warm day, departing 31L from intersection KK because the full length wasn't available).

We couldn't climb ahead to 500ft like the blunties do because Concorde would be much further along the runway owing to higher take off speeds and a lower initial climb rate until you'd got above 250kts. We'd then be flying the turn at 250kts rather than the 160kts ish of a blunty so you have a much bigger radius of turn.

The solution was quite inventive and did the job well, taking advantage of Concorde's excellent handing qualities. And it was most enjoyable to fly, to boot.

I flew back from JFK last week and it just ain't the same.

CJ I love the cartoon. Dude I agree with you about the sight of Concorde taking of on 31L at JFK. Unfortunatly I have only seen it on the ITTV DVD but I would think that seeing it live must have been amazing.
Regards
Nick

Nick Thomas
It really was totally amazing Nick, both when viewed from the ground and ESPECIALLY from the 'jump seat'. (We are talking pre-9/11 here of course). The problem was, the likes of my friend EXWOK made it look far too easy at first sight, but when you looked at the event more closely you realised that it was really a combination of a superbly manoeuvrable aeroplane and some superb, highly co-ordinated and disciplined flying by the three guys up front. (After experiencing my very first '31L' in the early 90s, after the turns and throttling were complete I remember saying to the captain 'can we do that again Chris, CAN we? ).
It used to be quite interesting at JFK, comparing the take-offs of Concorde and the 'blunties', as EXWOK affectionately refers to the subsonics. You always asked yourself 'if Concorde can do that why can't the rest? But again, as EXWOK said, 'it's just not the same'.

Best Regards
Dude

JFK 31L, Kennedy 9 Departure, Canarsie transition, Concorde climb


Speedbird 2, cleared take-off 31L.

You call 3-2-1 Now , start your stopwatch, pre-set to countdown from 58 seconds, and slam the throttles fully forward till they hit the stops. Four RR Olympus engines start to spool up to full power and four reheats kick in, together producing 156,000 lbs of thrust, but at a total fuel flow of 27,000 US gallons per hour. A touch of left rudder initially to keep straight, as the #4 engine limiter is limiting the engine to 88% until 60 kts when it will release it to full power. The F/O calls Airspeed building, 100 kts, V 1 , and then, at 195 kts, Rotate . You smoothly rotate the aircraft, lift-off occurs at around 10\xb0 and 215 kts. You hear a call of V 2 but you keep rotating to 13.5\xb0 and then hold that attitude, letting the aircraft accelerate.

The F/O calls Positive Climb and you call for the Gear Up . On passing 20 feet radio height, and having checked the aircraft attitude, airspeed and rate of climb are all satisfactory, the F/O calls Turn and you slowly and smoothly roll on 25\xb0 left bank to commence the turn out over Jamaica bay. Some knowledgeable passengers will have requested window seats on the left side of the aircraft at check-in, and are now being rewarded with a very close look at the waters of Jamaica Bay going by very fast! As you accelerate through 240 kts, the F/O calls 240 and you pitch up to 19\xb0 to maintain 250 kts and keep the left turn going to pass East of CRI.

54 seconds from the start of the take off roll you hear the F/O counting down 3-2-1 Noise whereupon the F/E cancel the re-heats and simultaneously throttles back to noise abatement power, around 96% as you pitch the nose down to 12\xb0 to maintain 250 kts. It is less than a minute from start of roll and already 435 US gallons of fuel have been used.


Speedbird 2, contact departure, so long.

Turning through heading 235\xb0M, the F/E quickly re-applies full dry power as you pitch up to 17\xb0 to maintain 250 kts, but simultaneously reduce the left bank to 7.5\xb0, in order to increase both the radius of turn (to stay on the optimum noise abatement track) and the rate of climb (less bank, higher RoC).

On climbing through 2,500 ft you increase the bank angle back to 25\xb0 left bank and as you approach the 253\xb0 radial JFK, you hear 3-2-1 Noise from the F/O for the second time. The F/E actions the second noise-abatement power cut back, you pitch down to 12\xb0 and, if not in cloud, sneak a quick peek out of your left hand window, looking for the car park by the Marine Parkway bridge, as you would ideally like to pass right over the car park, if possible, as we tip-toe quietly across the Rockaway Beaches, in order to minimise the noise impact on the residents.

Keep the left turn going and intercept the 176\xb0 radial outbound from CRI, and at 5 miles DME from CRI, call for the F/E to slowly re-apply full climb power as you pitch up to maintain 250 kts. We are still in US territorial airspace, below 10,000 ft, and subject to statutory speed control.


Speedbird 2, present position direct to SHIPP, climb FL230, no speed control.

The F/O selects direct SHIPP in the INS and tells you that she has selected that information into your Flight Director. Having checked that the gear lever is at neutral, you call for the Nose Up , and then the Visor Up . Flight deck noise levels drop dramatically as the Visor locks up. Now more than 12 miles away from the coast, we are clear of US speed control requirements so lower the attitude to 9\xb0, accelerate to V MO , currently 400 kts, and ask for the After Take Off Checks.


Speedbird 2, present position direct to LINND, climb in the block FL550-600, accelerate Mach 2.0

Call for the Climb Checklist at Mach 0.7, which will trigger the F/E to start pumping fuel rearwards to move the CG aft, then when he's done that, straight into the Transonic Checklist . Maintain 400 kts IAS, and around 24,500 ft, at M0.93, ask for the re-heats back on, in pairs, and raise the nose by 3\xb0 to maintain 400 kts as they kick in.

Precise, smooth flying is required through the high drag transonic region, as the mach meter creeps up towards Mach 1. A sudden flicker on the VSI and Altimeter confirms that the shock wave has just passed over the static ports, and the aircraft is now supersonic. A quick glance at the elapsed time indicator shows that you\x92ve been hand flying for just over 9 minutes since the start of the take off roll.

Another fun start to a day in the office, and to think we got paid for doing it!


Best Regards

Bellerophon

Thanks, Bellerophon !

That just went into my 'archive'.

Maybe it should be printed out, plastified, and used as a briefing sheet for the Brooklands simulator, where the JFK 31L take-off is still one of the favourites !

CJ

Thanks Dude and Bellerphon for such graphic descriptions of JFK 31L take off. Nearest I came to experiencing anything like that was landing at Kai Tak in the 80's!
Out of interest Bellerphon was there a supersonic acceleration point for JFK departures or as you were soon over the ocean, was it a case of it happened when it happened?
Regards
Nick
P.S Thanks Christiaan for your Concorde book thread. I am hoping that Santa brings me the Haynes manual!

You mean you actually were on one of the Concorde landings at Kai Tak?
You'll have everybody here green with envy....
Even if it was on a "blunty" it was still spectacular.
And I think Kai Tak is already in the Brooklands sim database.... so you can now come and fly it yourself....

I'll let Bellerophon answer.... but there once was a low-weight take-off from Cardiff straight out to sea, without any restrictions, that IIRC still holds the record for the shortest time to Mach 1 and Mach 2 from brake release....

No thanks needed... I hope you'll enjoy it as much as I did !

CJ