In many regards, the Concorde was one giant leap for mankind.
When British engineers ventured out to the extremities of aviation and developed plans for the world’s first supersonic passenger aircraft in 1962, they endeavored to make the impossible possible.
For starters, the cost of production would have been too steep for the British alone, so they partnered with the French on November 29, 1962, when the governments of Britain and France signed a concord to share the costs, the technology, and the risks of producing the Concorde. The agreement included a clause imposing heavy penalties for cancellation—because collaboration was the only option.
British Aerospace and the French company Aérospatiale would assemble the airframe, and France’s SNECMA and Britain’s Rolls Royce would develop the jet engines.
Seven years of developing the Concorde culminated in its first flight on Mach 2, 1969, and its first scheduled supersonic passenger service on January 21, 1976.
It could clock cruising speeds of up to 1,354 miles per hour! That is 2,179 km per hour! Mach 2.04—twice the speed of sound! Supersonic speed for a commercial plane!
The London-New York flight route ordinarily took 8½ hours on a regular airplane. But on the Concorde, that time was slashed to 3 hours.
The Concorde truly was one giant leap for mankind.
Pilot Mike Bannister once said, “You could do things with Concorde clearly you can’t do with other airplanes. Fabulous airplane to fly. Poetry in motion. Elegance in action. And fast, fast, fast.”
But in other regards, the Concorde also was one giant step backward for mankind.
For starters, it was only for the rich: The luxury of intercontinental supersonic travel came on a $10,000-ticket.
And then there were the design, production, and maintenance costs. The delta-winged Concorde had a pointed droop-nose that could be lowered when taxiing for take-off or when approaching a runway to improve pilot visibility. During flight, the nose would be raised. It had a special aluminum alloy called Hiduminium which, at supersonic speeds, could sustain aerodynamic heating of up to 261°F. The only painting permitted on the Concorde was highly reflective white paint to avoid overheating. Assembling one Concorde unit cost $53 million in 1977. That is $285 million by today’s dollar value.
The Concorde was decently profitable—until the afternoon of July 25, 2000. A Concorde crushed into a Paris hotel soon after take-off because of debris from a burst tire, killing all 109 passengers and crew, and four people on the ground. Following the accident, $40 million was spent in safety improvements, but fewer passengers showed interest in flying supersonic.
Besides that, the Concorde was a massive fuel guzzler. A Concorde’s taxi to the end of a runway used as much fuel as a Boeing 737’s flight from New York City to Philadelphia.
Also, the noise from the aircraft was considered “intolerable” by UK’s Noise Advisory Board. For this reason, the Concorde mostly flew over the Atlantic.
All these drawbacks eventually compelled Air France to retire the Concorde in May 2003, and British Airways to follow suit in October 2003. Thus ended the era of supersonic commercial air travel.
The Concorde has one giant lesson for all of us.
This wickedly fast commercial aircraft is a perfect example of mortal man’s propensity for developing systems and technologies which very well may be etched with disclaimers that read: “Designed by mortals. Assembled for immortals.” It is a perfect example of man’s penchant for developing systems and technologies which are quite ideal for immortals and quite impractical for mortals.
Mere mortals cannot withstand the physical, social, and pecuniary vortex which a three-hour flight across the Atlantic will inevitably create. Like flying from NYC at the closing bell of the New York Stock Exchange to arrive in London in plenty of time for the opening of trade at the London Stock Exchange. Or a business breakfast on one continent and a family dinner on another—in one day.
Similarly, mere mortals do not have the physiological capacity for the endless scroll of social media and for YouTube’s incessant video suggestions from its vault of 5 billion videos and one billion hours of content.
Also, mankind is not psychologically capable of coping with all the bad news about all the bad things happening in every neighborhood of every city of every country in the world. As such, your news feed was designed only for a psychologically superior species of beings no one has ever seen yet.
If the producers of your favorite sports shows thought you were mortal, they would have focused on broadcasting the game only. Instead, they spend so much time talking about what could happen in the game, what happened in the game, and why it happened, based on stats that are both intriguing and meaningless.
And then there is 24-hour TV, and on-demand TV and movies, which permit non-immortals an activity appropriately named after alcohol intoxication: binge-watching. (By the way, there has been a spike in the general usage of the word “binge,” and it is not because of a dramatic increase in 21-year-olds, and it also is not because of the invention of some binge worthy beer.)
Long gone is TV programming for mortals, which is what I grew up on: If you turned the TV on before 3:00 p.m.—instead of doing your homework and/or playing outdoors with neighborhood friends—static was all you saw. And if you turned the TV on after 11:00 p.m. or after midnight—instead of going to bed—you would also see nothing but static.
What I grew up on was closer to systems designed for mortals; almost perfectly in sync with human limitations.
However, when these systems “advanced,” they ventured into the realm of high-speed streaming, instant gratification, same-day free shipping, normalized FOMO—into the realm of limitless immortals.
But unlike with the Concorde, there has been no going back, no course correction, and no slowing down.
Learn from the Concorde.
Always remember: Just because you can do it doesn’t mean you should. Availability is not obligation. Just because others are doing it doesn’t mean you should. Ubiquity is not importance.
In a world seemingly designed for immortals, remember we are mere mortals who not only have limitations but need limitations.
Reevaluate every aspect of your life, and start paying more attention to those things that were not designed with your human limitations in mind.
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