Posted on 06/27/2025 5:50:24 AM PDT by Red Badger
British Airways Concorde G-BOAC Eduard Marmet/Wikimedia Commons
The legendary Concorde, a supersonic airliner, is slated to make its commercial comeback by 2026.
The U.S. President Donald J. Trump signed legislation that lifted the previous ban on supersonic flight over land on June 6, 2025.
“This order begins a historic national effort to reestablish the United States as the undisputed leader in high-speed aviation,” the official White House statement stated.
Since 1973, this ban has ensured that American skies remained free of sonic booms.
The new rule change paves the way for a new age of air travel, which will be “faster, quieter, safer, and more efficient than ever before.”
With this new rule, Fly-Concorde Limited plans to return supersonic passenger flights from the U.S.
The redesigned Concorde is expected to fly with greater speed, less noise, and reduced emissions compared to the original version.
Use of sustainable fuel
The new Concorde version will keep its classic look, but it’s been redesigned with modern engineering, making it a very different aircraft from the original.
It’ll be 50% lighter, thanks to advanced composite materials.
And in a monumental leap for environmental responsibility, it will run on Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF), slashing emissions by a remarkable 80%.
As per the website, the new Concorde is expected to fly at 60,000 feet, a considerably greater height than standard commercial jets.
Interestingly, it could slash the London to New York flight time to just 2 hours, down from the current 6 hours and 12 minutes.
“A lot of people are already talking about supersonic flight, that it’s an enormous step forward to get there and would require billions of dollars of investment — we have to take all this one step at a time, because our airplane the CONCORDE already flew for the past 60 years and for 30 years carried more than 2 million paying customers across the skies,” said Dr Pano Kroko Churchill, founder and CEO of Fly Concorde.
“It’s an evolution that’s come full circle with the new CONCORDE,” Churchill added.
High competition
To fully grasp the significance of this return, it’s essential to understand its beginnings.
The Concorde’s development began with a visionary 1962 treaty between France and the UK, a joint effort to conquer the challenges of supersonic transport
After its first flight in 1969, the Concorde began commercial service on January 21, 1976.
British Airways and Air France launched initial routes, quickly adding transatlantic flights to Washington Dulles and New York JFK that took less than three and a half hours, a remarkable speed for its time. Flying at Mach 2.04 (2,179 km/h), it was considered an engineering marvel.
Despite initial worldwide interest, the original Concorde struggled commercially due to high operating costs, restricted routes (primarily because of its loud sonic boom), and continuous financial losses. Reportedly, only 14 aircraft ever entered service.
Then, tragedy struck. On July 25, 2000, Air France Flight 4590 crashed shortly after takeoff from Paris. The incident involved a tire bursting, a fuel tank puncturing, and a devastating fire erupting. All 109 on board and 4 on the ground perished.
This terrible accident, compounded by rising maintenance costs and fewer passengers, signaled the end for the Concorde.
Air France retired its planes in May 2003, and British Airways followed in October of the same year, seemingly ending commercial supersonic flights.
With its planned return by 2026, the Concorde is re-entering a competitive field.
It now joins several other companies – Boom Supersonic, Exosonic, Spike Aerospace, and Hermeus – all actively working to develop the next generation of supersonic (and even hypersonic) aircraft.
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AVIATION PING!....................
NY to London. Quickness between two Islamic cities.
London is not Islamic.
Neither is NYC.
I guess “climate change” really is dead now for the Leftists!
Now if I can scratch up the 15K per ticket it will likely cost to fly on the new Concorde....
You might want to check your demographics (and mayors) there.
Question is, who in their right mind is in a hurry to get to England? 😆
You misspelled Christian.
If really entering service in 2026, I’d expect to see pictures of the new plane, not the old one.
Or maybe the new plane isn’t particularly “new”.
How nice. It’ll be like flying from New York to Pakistan in 2 hours. Don’t forget to bring your young daughters. Hard pass on that.
Mayor of London is Muslim.
But is London a Muslim majority city?
Nope.
Neither is New York City.
lol. I went to London and never saw an Englishman.
2023 one way ticket from London to NY was $2800
I believe, Joe, this comment supra, from RedBadger was one of sympathetic hyperbole, emphasizing the demographic
lean of the two cities.
Please, lighten up a bit? 😏
I remember back in the 60’s, the jets training over Texas would make sonic booms that would rattle the single pane glass in my grandmas house! Good times!!
I’ve lived in both London ans New York.
London is full of Englishmen.
Are there lots of Muslims?
Yes.
Are they the majority?
Nope.
“The U.S. President Donald J. Trump signed legislation that lifted the previous ban on supersonic flight over land on June 6, 2025. “
Somehow, I missed that.
Few will be able to afford the ticket price.
“In 1977, it cost £431 to fly one way onboard Concorde between London and Washington. Adjusted for inflation, that’s about £2,200 ($2,800) in today’s money. However, fare prices gradually went up, and by 1996, a roundtrip across the Atlantic would generally be priced at around $12,500 in today’s money.”
(2023)
https://simpleflying.com/concorde-cost/
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