The Concorde supersonic jet made trips from New York to London, across the Atlantic, in only three and a half hours, a record time for commercial aviation.
There was nothing like the Concorde when it went into flight service in 1976, and there’s been nothing like it since. This supersonic jet was able to fly faster than sound travels, breaking the sound barrier for the first time in commercial flight. It had an iconic, unforgettable look, with a sleek body, no tail, a delta wing, and a droop nose that could lower for takeoff and landing.
The Concorde could achieve incredible speeds thanks to its four turbojet engines. These Rolls-Royce Olympus engines used reheat technology, which reheats gas to extreme temperatures in the afterburner combustor for extra power at take-off and during the transition to supersonic flight. With this technology, the Concorde could make record-breaking flight times, traveling from New York to London in less than three and a half hours. Today, about 50 years since the Concorde first made its debut, that same flight takes approximately seven hours!
The Concorde emerged during a time of great achievement in aviation, soon after the moon landing in 1969.
