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.
(tip of the hat to New Concord, Ohio! No airplane will ever replace you!)
Doesn’t take a majority Muslim population for influence.
Now that's progress. I don't get why the plane sonic boom over an ocean even matters?
The new plane is the old plane just refurbished.............
I won't be booking a flight at that cost. I don't drive a Bentley either.
I did, only saw prices from years ago, but I didn’t look over the results long. Under $1000 is reasonable for rich folks or vacation folks who budget for it. Ida thunk the price was a lot more.
“Since 1973, this ban has ensured that American skies remained free of sonic booms.”
If the writer of this story didn’t HATE THE MILITARY* so much, he’d know that anyone who lives near an Air Force base would disagree with him.
*he’s a journalist, therefore he required to hate the military (except when used to kill Serbs or Ruzzians).
Just stop.
In the last census,White British population accounted for 36.8% of London’s population, 63.2% of residents identifying with an ethnic minority group.
In the school system, 72% of pupils belong to an ethnic group other than White British.
Smoking Joe says it’s under $1000 now- still kinda high, but a .ot better than I imagined it would be- good for folks that have to travel for business and can write it off.
Somehow, I don’t see it happening. There may not be enough people willing to pay the price to get there a few hours faster.
“ Now if I can scratch up the 15K per ticket it will likely cost to fly on the new Concorde....” Back in the early 1990’s, Cunard cruise line had a limited special offer. If you booked a transatlantic passage on their ocean liner the QE2, you could return to the states from London Heathrow on the British Airways Concorde for $300 !
Don’t be surprised, some people have not been to London, at least recently. We’ll see with NYC though.
“I doubt he can implement Islamic policies in New York City with Trump in power. “
The bigger block on him will be the state government. Almost all of his very left wing ideas will require state approval, the feds will play virtually no part.
At the last census London was about 15% Muslim
As a British ex-pat - I hate to say it, but London has been conquered.
By who?
It only tzkes 5% before they start becoming a real problem.
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