Classic British Flight Sim

Hi, Just thought i would share this with you.

I have seen a few programs on Concorde's crash in Paris but today i watched a program and either i had missed it in the past where it was said at least 10 witnesses said flames were seen behind the aircraft before she stuck that metal strip on the runway that came off the Continental Airways DC10 that had taken off just before it,

So it looks like she had a blowout on the Port side and ran over the strip which buried into one of the tyre's, marks on the runway indicate that she was moving to the left before she reached V1 and that the aircraft had not reached it's take off speed.

I used to see Concorde regularly coming in from the US when i lived in the West Country and landing at Heathrow, a great sight and a great aircraft,

Cheers,

Roger.

Roger : although the Bureau d' Enquetes has come in for a lot of stick, the official report still stands . I'll lay odds that your TV programme was heavily fed by Continental who still have civil liability problems ! In any event, how would the eye-witnesses know where and when the metal strip was picked up, so as to say whether the fire appeared before or after that event ? If you have read as many reports as I have had to over the years, you will know that eye witnesses rarely agree about any important matters, particularly the sequence of events, and in aviation accidents one of the things that invariably gets people confused is that for the most part you see the event ( according to distance ) anything between 5 and 15 seconds before you hear it

Just looking at the report again, V1 ( in this case 150 KIAS and a ground speed of about 158 kts ) was reached at 32 to 33 seconds after brake release , and it was not until 43 seconds after brake release just as the aircraft was rotated ( 183 KIAS ) that ATC told the crew of the fire and simultaneously the engineer announced the failure of the no 2 engine . Analysis of the string of debris found on the runway makes it clear that the initial damage sequences started well before this, between 1600 and 1800 metres from the threshold, and the deviation to the left from the original track started at about 2200 metres, the marks being from a deflated tyre . The mangled piece of metal which was from the DC10 was at block 152 of the R/w , about 1700 metres into the takeoff roll, and the slit tyre piece was found at about the same location. Thus it is quite clear that even taking a neutral view , whatever happened, including the picking up of the metal and the slitting of the tyre, was something like 1000 metres before the flames were noted and the engine failure made itself felt ( although there was kerosene contamination, then minor sooting , and then major sooting of the R/w from about 1800 metres on, the major fire evidence was at 2800 metres + )