So it's just over 20 years since Concorde had its last flight.

Even saw an actual Concorde in flight through the clouds when it flew into Dublin airport.

Roll on roughly 10 years and I saw one parked in JFK on St Stephens day 1996 when I landed there on EI from Dublin.

I accidentally saw it take off at Heathrow last flight of some sort , amazing

Could be wrong but always thought it only came here once for the above.

Was on a decommissioned one a few years back, it's very clostrophobic compared to your normal run of the mill jet. Everything inside said luxury, fancy dining etc.

I remember the Irish members of the European Ryder Cup team came back to Dublin from the States on it in the mid-90s

Channel 4 showed a documentary on Concorde recently, it was very interesting.

One of the things that killed it before it really got going was the banning of Concorde over land space by USA and other countries because of the sonic booms. It ruined the order book and severely restricted the destinations. The UK and France couldn't ban it because their governments were highly involved in the project.

I was wrong! Good thread on Concorde in Ireland here, gotta love the Pepsi one.

You are in a way. It flew into and from SNN quite often on crew training flights. Being Atlantic adjacent meant it could go supersonic quicker than from UK and it gave a large runway for landing practice.

AFAIK, the only passenger flight from Ireland via Concorde was the draw you mention,(as in to other countries) but, it was quite a common visitor to SNN back in the day.

For the aviation enthusiast who has everything, here's a unique chance to buy a Concorde engine complete with afterburner on eBay if you have £565,000 lying around:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/113823113322?_ul=BY

Flight "to New York" but no mention of a flight back. Sign of the times 🤣

A rather expensive static aviation / industrial museum piece…

5.5 tonnes in weight, 18 x 5 ft dimensions

the costs involved in transporting it would be significant. You’d need a rigid most likely, I don’t think a box body would cut the mustard transporting that and its stand. That said if you can afford to spunk well over half a million euros on that, you can certainly afford the ground transportation….

Probably one of the most elegant aircraft built, always reminded me of a swan coming into land...

My first experience seeing it was a trip to London in early 90's with my parents. They gave me a choice in terms of a treat for the day... go on a boat on the Thames or head out to Heathrow to see it take off and do some planespotting... Never forget the noise of it or how futuristic it looked. On the same trip went to Duxford Airfield and experienced going inside the prototype.

Remember the Pepsi/AF one taking off 10 when I was living in Portmarnock, that was a sight too. Never got to fly in it but have experienced visiting inside the BA concorde in Seattle Museum of Flight and Air France at Air and Space Museum in Le Bourget. Such a remarkable machine and 20 years on still in awe of it.

Have to say The Museum of Flight in Seattle is well worth a visit, you get to see inside B707 JFK used as AF1 and also see the B747 prototype (but not go inside). I was based in Vancouver for 6 months at the time so took a trip on a Greyhound bus as a birthday present across the border and did the Boeing Factory tour as well. The BA concorde there had fairly long queues to go through it, Cockpit and passenger seats at the time were not accessible. Le Bourget is great too especially if you like anything to do with Space as well as aviation in general... For me I think Le Bourget pips it for the experience, you get to see and board 2 Concordes (Air France passenger version and a prototype test) which is a bonus.

Was on one at the Intrepid museum in NYC about a decade ago. Wonderful piece of engineering for its time. It'd be so cool if one could be restored to flying condition for exhibitions and the like. The cost would obviously be massive but they're a part of aviation history that should never be forgotten.

A quick Google says it's currently still off-site and won't be back on the Intrepid until Spring 2024

Lucky to have an example in my local museum (Udvar-Hazy in Virginia).

An incredible machine but I think the use case for it these days is limited given the accomodations in the newest gen aircraft and the fact you can stay connected from the US to Europe with the progression of inflight wifi quality, J pax accommodations and the composite aircraft helping with lower pressurization.

I think its pretty incredible you can do US east coast to DUB in damn near 5hrs if the jetstream is cooperating.

There's no doubt there would have been a lot less fuss about the noise in the US back then if it'd been a Boeing.

I was also one of the lucky ones. The thing that sticks in my mind even more than the excellent food, wine & service was, having contorted myself into a position where you could just about look out of the tiny window, just how deeply indigo blue the sky above was at 60,000-odd feet; and how you could see the slight curvature of the earth from that altitude. Amazing machine…

Nitpick: it only held 100 passengers and it was a charter flight, so for most of them it was planned to be a once in a lifetime trip...

I also flew on it in 2002 back from jfk

We were in the rear cabin which was quieter and also had the mach clock on the divider in front

There was no difference between the cabins

We were served afternoon tea with champagne

The toilet was tiny,I had to crouch

I also distintly remember 2 things,the blue hue of the curvature of the earth and the captain coming on not long out of jfk saying he was onto Irish Air traffic control already and updated our eta

We boarded directly from the concorde lounge in jfk

You could book or upgrade to concorde very easily with BA miles at the time,now known as avios

It's a myth to say you had to be rich

Not many paid the published prices for those flights or do today for first/business either nor a fraction of them