- Start
- Mar 2, 196990% CONFIDENCEfrom the source
Concorde Makes Its First Flight From Toulouse
- Concorde flew for the first time from Toulouse on 2 March 1969, after construction of six prototypes began in February 1965.[1]
- Studies had begun in 1954 and a UK–France treaty followed in 1962, with the programme cost estimated at £70 million.[1]
- It was jointly developed and manufactured by Sud Aviation and the British Aircraft Corporation.[1]
- It received its French certificate of airworthiness on 9 October 1975 and UK CAA certification on 5 December, entering service on 21 January 1976; 20 were built.[1]
Notable features
- The design has a narrow fuselage seating four abreast for 92 to 128 passengers, an ogival delta wing, and a droop nose for landing visibility.[1]
- Four Rolls-Royce/Snecma Olympus 593 turbojets with variable intake ramps and reheat took it supersonic.[1]
- It was the first airliner with a fly-by-wire flight-control system (analogue in this case), and its avionics were the first in a commercial aircraft to use hybrid circuits.[1]
- It cruised at an average Mach 2.02 (2,150 km/h) with a maximum cruising altitude of 60,000 ft, flying the transatlantic routes in just under 3.5 hours against about eight hours for subsonic jets from Paris to New York.[1]
- It is 61.66 m long with a 25.6 m wingspan and a maximum takeoff weight of 185,070 kg; each engine gave 140 kN of thrust dry and 169.3 kN with afterburner, for a range of 7,222.8 km.[1]
References 383% CONFIDENCE
The first entry is always the pin's source. Overall confidence is a weighted average of how firmly each reference supports the start and end times used above; a reference counts half as much for every 180 days older than the newest.
- [1]90%en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concordeen.wikipedia.org· Posted Sep 21, 2026· Starts Mar 2, 1969 ✓· 33% of score
Happened as dated, per en.wikipedia.org: "Construction of six prototypes began in February 1965, with the first flight from Toulouse on 2 March 1969."
- [2]85%Concorde, Fox Alpha, Air Franceairandspace.si.edu· Added Sep 21, 2026· 33% of score
The Smithsonian’s Concorde record confirms that Concorde 001, assembled at Toulouse, took to the air on 2 March 1969 with French test pilot André Turcat at the controls.[1]
- [3]75%Concorde’s historyaerospacebristol.org· Added Sep 21, 2026· 33% of score
The museum on Concorde’s British assembly site at Filton, giving the programme’s Anglo-French history alongside the French prototype’s first flight.[1]
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