Back in February this year, Alpha Foxtrot made it’s final move - under tow - across a runway at Bristol Filton airport, and ended up in a specially built new hangar at the Bristol Aerospace Museum where it will be on display for future generations to see, including myself. This is one good reason for me to place a solid, and large, red pin in the map on Bristol.
According to the website of the museum, the museum will have the Concorde 216 at display as the “show-stopping” centrepiece. "The aircraft which was designed, built and tested in Bristol, she was the last Concorde to be built and the last to fly". I recommend you visit not only their webpage news page to see some truly stunning photos from this final roll, but to also join me some day visiting their museum.
For the past 13 years, Alpha Foxtrot has stood still on the tarmac awaiting better placement, as the last of the fleet of supersonic Condorde’s. Alpa Foxtrot is according to my notes, the 20th and last of the Concorde’s built, and started it’s service to the high end of the public back in 1979. Perhaps coincidentally, it was also the last Concorde to ever be airborne commercially in 2003.
As fun-facts still stand today, building the Concorde was considered to be as technologically advanced as the lunar landing. With a top speed of 2180 km/hour, the aircraft sat an around the world record back in august of 1995: a Concorde took off from New York, flew around the world and landed back in New York again 31 hours 27 minutes and 49 seconds later. During that long trip, the Concorde had made 8 landings to refuel, so actually flight time was only 22 hours and 39 minutes.
The rest is history. Great history.
Screen drop of the Concorde prior to her final roll. Image: Google Earth.
