Why didn’t it succeed?

Concorde flights came to a screeching halt after only 27 years of operation on October 24, 2003. The reason? Excessive cost, high fares, and loud noise. On a regular flight, Concordes consumed 6,771 gallons of fuel, which quickly exceeded the profit made from the flight. In addition to that, only a total of 20 Concordes were built and no airline ordered them except for Air France and British Airways, who had to as they were state-run airlines at the time.

Oh, and a 2000 crash that killed everyone on board (109 people) and four people on the ground.

  • Phoenixz@lemmy.ca
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    11
    ·
    1 month ago

    What killed the Concorde was economics. It simply wasn’t worth while doing and then when one finally crashed that one time, the entire fleet was mothballed

    • Whats_your_reasoning@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      10
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      1 month ago

      the entire fleet was mothballed

      For anyone who was as confused as I was -

      To mothball: to stop using a piece of equipment but keep it in good condition so that it can easily be used again

      I’ve spent over 35 years speaking (and studying) this bizarre language we call English. Yet until seeing your comment, I had no idea “mothball” could be a verb. TIL!

      • 667@lemmy.radio
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        10
        ·
        edit-2
        1 month ago

        Wait until you hear about pickling. A number of military aircraft at the “boneyard” At Davis-Monthan AFB are still suitable for service; their engines having been removed and pickled within a special crate beside the aircraft.

        Marine desalination systems are pickled between extended periods of non-use.

        And there’s also the traditional use for pickled.

        • Buddahriffic@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          4
          ·
          1 month ago

          At first I read “engineers” instead of “engines” and wondered if there was revival process or if they just didn’t want the engineers working on anything else.

      • JackbyDev@programming.dev
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        1 month ago

        Honestly I haven’t seen it often. I think the first time I saw it was actually in a Crusader Kings 2 or Europa Universalis 4 tutorial video because it was an option you could do to your forts or something to reduce upkeep.

    • Species8472@discuss.tchncs.de
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      3
      ·
      1 month ago

      True. And the fact that because of sonic boom it was not allowed to fly supersonic above land. Only when it reached the atlantic supersonic was allowed. So it’s practical use was quite limited.

      Boom is working on a ‘successor’ to the Concorde without the loud boom when going above speed of sound.

      • CookieOfFortune@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        1 month ago

        That’s specifically a US regulation, but costly as coast to coast across the US would be the only other viable route.

        • Nighed@feddit.uk
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          1 month ago

          Possibly only existing as a reg because it wasn’t an American plane…

      • tempest@lemmy.ca
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        1 month ago

        They do but if you saw pictures of the inside you would see it was pretty tight. The super rich have their own jets and the regular rich prefer their pods.