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The Collapse of the Concordé Essay example

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The Collapse of the Concordé October 24,last departure of the Concordé and farewell to the supersonic airplane, the engineering triumph that was ahead of its time. This powerful machine made its last journey from New York to London. For many people it was a dream that came true and is now dying but still a lot of them will be waving their hands at Heathrow to pay the last tribute to this miraculous aircraft. Are we going backwards and not making any progress? This question makes me think of development and failure of technology. Are we going to stop trying and improving? Are we going back to traditional? It all began when two former super powers; Britain and France tried to outdo the …show more content…

Fuselage was made of copper-based aluminum alloy. Inside it was better than a 5-star hotel; it had leather-trimmed air-conditioned comfort. They served champagne and caviar to rich “rock-stars, executives and royalty”. Some of the lucky stewardesses had a chance to talk to celebrities like the violinist Yihudi Menuhin and Placido Domingo. But of course not everything in the Concordé was glorious for it had several rivals. By the mid 60s, the American rival appeared, supported by president Kennedy. Americans created a monster machine capable of carrying 240 passengers at 2000 mph, crossing the Atlantic in 100 minutes (it was going to be better than the Concordé). But fortunately for the Europeans the wooden mock-up was the closest the Americans managed to get. But Americans were not the only ones who wanted to make better aircraft than the British and French Concordé. Also the Russians made the version of the supersonic plane called “Konkordski” that was technically more perfect but not visually. This Russian triumph colapsed together with the plane at Paris air show in 1973. In the beginning of the Concordé history, airlines all over the world announced to buy 74 aircrafts. Technically two things were going well but already there were black clouds on the horizon. Beside financial problems and persistent rivals, the Arab oil crisis was

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