Though Audrey Hepburn didn’t actually deliver that line in her 1954 film Sabrina, it’s widely attributed to her, and having lived in Paris for three years, I couldn’t agree more. To this day, I never need an excuse to go. I’d happily hop the pond to La Ville-Lumière for the opening of an envelope.

But on one day in April 2000, Paris became a great idea, an incredible idea, une très, très bonne idée—no, that’s not hyperbolic enough. On one April day, Paris became the best idea ever, as I booked myself on Air France Flights AF001 and AF002 aboard Concorde for a round trip from New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport (KJFK) to Paris’ Charles de Gaulle Airport (LFPG).

To say a flight on Concorde (not “the” Concorde) was unlike one on any other commercial aircraft is an understatement. The delta-winged Concorde was a truly unique airplane and an extraordinary feat of aeronautical engineering, especially for its time. Incorporating groundbreaking technologies like fly-by-wire, it was as stunning and graceful as it was swift, scorching the stratosphere at altitudes high enough to make a flat-earther blush. On my particular flights, we got up to FL580 and Mach 2.02—faster than a bullet and high enough to plainly see the curvature of the Earth.

• READ MORE: Tripping the Light Fantastic

From its first flight a few months before Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the moon to its first commercial flights in 1976—G-BOAA, London to Bahrain and F-BVFA, Paris to Rio de Janeiro via Dakar, Senegal—to its final flights 27 years later, Concorde captured hearts, minds, and dreams around the world. Coincidentally, F-BVFA is also the airplane I flew on from New York City to Paris. It is now on display at the National Air and Space Museum’s Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center. 

Tuesday, October 24 marks the 20th anniversary of the final scheduled commercial flights of Concorde. On that day, British Airways Concorde G-BOAG, as BA002, took off from JFK, with chief pilot Mike Bannister at the controls, and landed at London’s Heathrow Airport (EGLL) a scant few hours later, but not before “Alpha Golf” formed up with two other Concordes for a low formation pass over London.

Alpha Golf is now on display at the Museum of Flight in Seattle. On its way to retirement—because of course it did—G-BOAG set a New York-to-Seattle speed record of 3 hours, 55 minutes, 2 seconds, flying supersonic over Canada along the way. As one would expect, Concorde holds many speed records, including the fastest Atlantic crossing and New York to London in 2 hours, 52 minutes, 59 seconds.

The final scheduled passenger flight for an Air France Concorde came earlier in 2003 on May 31. That morning, Concorde F-BTSD, as AF001, departed JFK at 8:15 a.m. and landed at 4:30 p.m. local time in Paris. That airframe is on display near Paris at the National Air and Space Museum of France, located at Paris Airport-Le Bourget (LFPB) .

There are just three Concordes on display in the U.S. In addition to the two mentioned earlier, British Airways G-BOAD is preserved at the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in New York City.

I recently caught up with both Bannister and John Tye, another British Airways Concorde captain, and asked them both what they thought about this anniversary. 

“I was fortunate enough to fly that last flight from New York to London,” said Bannister. “Every time I go to Brooklands [Museum near London] and look at the stylish lines of our Concorde there, she still looks like she was designed only a few years ago, very 21st century. I also still find it difficult to get my mind around just how technically advanced she was—an aeroplane that could carry 100 passengers 1,350 miles per hour across the Atlantic in great safety. We did something then that can’t be done now.

“When we look at Concorde, there is nothing like it today. It’s amazing to think that the last flight was 20 years ago. It seems like yesterday, both literally and metaphorically.”

Tye wasn’t flying any of the final flights.

“I was at a beach bar in Barbados, rum and coke in hand and tears streaming down my face as I watched Mike land that last airplane,” Tye said. “On October 24, there will be a big crew reunion at Brooklands. All flight crew, cabin crew, ground staff, 196 people coming together. Concorde is an aluminum tube. It’s the people who brought her alive, made her so special. We were just the privileged ones who got to fly Concorde and get paid for it—absolutely astonishing.”

Look for more in 2024 from FLYING Media Group on Concorde. I will detail not only my own experiences flying on the airplane but also bring you along as we meet the pilots who flew Concorde and get into the weeds with them about what she was really like to fly.

Editor’s Note: This article first appeared on Plane & Pilot.

The post October 24 Marks 20 Years Since Final Scheduled Concorde Flights appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

Lego has even made several name-brand representations, including the Learjet, Sopwith Camel, and the Sud Aviation Caravelle. None, however, are likely to excite LEGO-enthusiast pilots as much as the company’s latest offering, Concorde.

• READ MORE: Concorde in Photos

One can only imagine how many interpretations of the iconic supersonic airliner LEGO fans of all ages have constructed, but this latest version probably is what many of them wanted.

The 2,083-piece set is a scale model of the historic aircraft that builders can pose on its display stand in various flight modes. The set also offers detailed landing gear, a tilting nose section, and a removable roof showing the cabin interior.

Built in the 1960s as part of a joint venture between the United Kingdom and France, the real Concorde could cruise at about twice the speed of sound, or Mach 2. This impressive pace cut travel times between the U.S. and Europe down to reasonable lengths. Flights from Paris to New York took about three and a half hours, though one of the airplanes set a record of just under three hours.

The Lego model is 41.5 inches long, 17 inches wide, and more than 6 inches high. Sets will be available starting September 7 at a price of $199.99.

The post LEGO Group Gets Aviation Fans’ Attention with Unveiling of Concorde Set appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

“I doubt it,” I thought, after looking at the radar. There was a line of thunderstorms associated with a cold front stretching north to south across our route.

“Nah,” said Jason, “We’ll fly above that stuff.” Such was my introduction to flying jets, in this case the Lear-jet 31. With a service ceiling of 51,000 feet, there weren’t many clouds we couldn’t top; at least theoretically. I say theoretically because getting a Lear to Flight Level 510 before running out of jet-A was a challenge. Nonetheless, I was learning about the benefits (and perils) of high-altitude flight.

Starting out in a Cessna 150, altitude was a pretty simple matter. With careful attention to density altitude, most takeoffs were possible and cruising altitudes were seldom much more than a few thousand feet above mean sea level.

Owning a Cessna P210 got me thinking about pressurization, advantages of flights in the high “teens,” and the thrill of announcing my presence at a flight level. Though credited with a service ceiling of 25,000 feet, I doubt I ever made it higher than FL210. That was exhilarating enough for me. A Hank Williams Jr. song called “High and Pressurized” became my anthem. “It don’t take long to get there if you’re high and pressurized,” went the first verse. It is a tune about the satisfaction that comes with owning or renting a pressurized airplane. There’s a line about the mile high club, but that’s a topic for a different day (and maybe a different publication).

Pressurized piston airplanes have the admirable trait of being able to fly low into headwinds and to ride the tailwinds up high. Turboprops aren’t so lucky. These airplanes basically have jet engines that are more fuel efficient the higher they fly, so bucking headwinds down low rarely makes sense over long distances. With service ceilings of 28,000 to 31,000 feet, you aren’t going to top any big thunderstorms in a turboprop either.

Jets, however, make surmounting the weather a real possibility. That Lear 31 trip was my introduction to such magnificence. In fact, we laughed at my naiveté and at the wall of lightning and mayhem beneath us as we roared westward at FL430. Later that night, we retraced our route from Texas to St. Petersburg, Florida (KPIE), and climbed to FL470. We would have kept climbing, but the peninsula of Florida was fast approaching—and we didn’t want to overshoot and end up in Spain.

I don’t know how high I have been. I mean that in a strict sense of altitude msl. Redeeming mileage points, I rode on Concorde once from KJFK in New York to Heathrow (EGLL) in London. After much whining and begging, I was allowed to enter the cockpit. I was astounded to see the altimeters showing 52,640 feet (I think). Given a block altitude (who else was going to be up here?), the pilots said they just sought the best altitude for the prevailing winds and temperature. The airplane was so fast—it routinely cruised at Mach 2.0—that eastbound trips and westbound trips weren’t but a few minutes different in regards to time en route. Soon, I was ushered back out of the cockpit by a stern British Airways flight attendant, so I really don’t know how high we actually got.

Part 135 flying in a Cessna Citation CJ3 was my real classroom for learning about high-altitude flight. With a straight wing and hence relatively docile flying characteristics up high, we consistently flew at FL450 when possible. With generous and knowledgeable captains, I learned that although we could top those huge Midwest thunderstorms at FL450, it was still a good idea to avoid flying directly over them. Just because it looked clear didn’t mean there weren’t ferocious funnels of turbulence rising from these prodigious forces of nature.

I’m currently privileged to fly a Cessna CJ1. Its service ceiling is FL410, but I had never been that high in it until recently. Powered by two Williams FJ44-1A engines with a “mere” 1,900 pounds of thrust each, the CJ1 never seemed very enthusiastic about flying above FL390. Then I was taught a lesson.

While the airplane was parked at Wichita’s Dwight D. Eisenhower National Airport (KICT) for a routine maintenance visit, the Textron Aviation service center per-formed scheduled engine checks and replaced some seals. As part of their post-maintenance protocol, they flew the airplane. I watched with amazement on flightaware.com as the Textron pilots flew right up to 41,000 feet.

Two days later, I was headed from KICT to Lebanon, New Hampshire (KLEB), a distance of 1,200 nm. With just a modest tailwind and me as the airplane’s only occupant, ForeFlight calculated I would land with 908 pounds of fuel. Though certainly legal, my personal minimum is 1,000 pounds of gas upon landing. Good weather was forecast at the destination for the next eight hours. After that, Hurricane Irma was to wash the Northeast clean.

I decided to start out with the intent to climb to FL410,carefully check position, time en route, and fuel consumption against ForeFlight’s nav log, and see what happened. Thirty-nine minutes after takeoff, I was level at 41,000 feet; better than the 48 minutes shown on the navlog. The airplane felt exhausted, as if it had flung itself onto the shore after a difficult marathon swim, but gradually recaptured airspeed such that I was soon clocking 357 ktas and 0.62 Mach, as predicted.

The tailwind was slow to materialize but fuel flow was down to 320 pounds per side, less than 100 gallons an hour. The Avidyne 550s showed me landing with 855 pounds of gas—not ideal, but that didn’t include fuel saved when the power is retarded for descent. This number also improved when those 60 knots of tailwind made their long awaited appearance.

So, I sat there, fat, dumb, and happy. In time, the Nexrad radar update showed me skirting the hurricane and zooming along at a groundspeed of 435 knots. I was euphoric. I poured a cup of coffee and nuzzled the oxygen mask. I’m told the song “Eight Miles High” by the Byrdsis about drugs. With the cabin altitude at just over 7,600 feet, hot coffee at my side, and improving estimated fuel-at-destination calculations, I required zero drugs for mood enhancement.

Oh, yes, I landed with 990 pounds of gas and a 1,200-mile smile.

Editor’s Note: This article originally appeared in the Q2 2022 issue of FLYING Magazine.

The post Flying ‘Way Up There’ appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

In other words: Is faster always better? 

To try and answer that question, NASA has hired Atlanta-based SpaceWorks Enterprises to study the economic prospects, examining what the company describes as a “range of potential aircraft configurations that are representative of the systems currently planned for development by the aerospace industry.”

It comes during a busy time. In Denver, a 65- to 88-passenger supersonic jet is currently being developed by United Airlines-backed Boom Supersonic. In Texas, a Houston company called Venus just announced it’s working on a hypersonic space plane for 12 passengers. And U.S. Air Force-backed Hermeus is developing a hypersonic airplane that might have passenger applications in the coming decades. 

“This is a great opportunity for us to continue to address some fundamental questions regarding the technical and economic viability of high-speed commercial air travel,” said SpaceWorks CEO Dr. John Olds in a released statement. 

• READ MORE: Boom Supersonic: Five Things to Know

SpaceWorks aims to study the market to help NASA to gain a deeper understanding “of the potential public benefits that might exist here,” said the company’s CTO Dr. John Bradford in the release. “Our prior work on point-to-point flight has quantified the sensitivity of the return-on-investment of these systems and underscored the need to ‘right-size’ the aircraft to capture specific markets.”

• READ MORE: Texas-based Venus Aerospace Working on Hypersonic Transport

Specifically, the company will evaluate “design drivers such as flight speed, operational range, passenger count, fuel type, ticket price, and fleet size. This work will leverage recent NASA investments in obtaining elastic market trends and identification of the most promising high-traffic routes between cities around the world.”

Technical Challenges

From a technical standpoint, achieving high speeds creates significant technological challenges, which helps to explain why piloted hypersonic vehicles have been limited to spacecraft and NASA’s rocket-powered experimental X-15. 

Hypersonic speeds create extremely hot air flows around the aircraft. Mitigating air flow temperatures and other technological challenges will be critical to success. According to Lockheed Martin, these are the generally accepted ranges in four basic levels of high-speed flight:

• Subsonic = <610 mph
• Transonic = 610-915 mph
• Supersonic = 915-3,840 mph
• Hypersonic = 3,840+ mph

Economic Hurdles

From an economic perspective, a major initial gateway to success will be funding. In the early 2000s, Aerion Corporation’s plan to develop a 12-passenger supersonic business jet never came to fruition. The company folded in 2021 citing lack of funds.

• READ MORE: Raytheon Invests in Hermeus Hypersonic Aircraft

Another economic hurdle that will have to be solved surrounds the cost of day-to-day operations. 

Concorde

When talking about the economics of high-speed commercial airlines, it’s hard not to think about Concorde, built by Aérospatiale/BAC and in service from 1976 to 2003. A flight from London to New York typically burned about one ton of jet fuel per seat—helping to drive the average cost of a round trip ticket to about $12,000, according to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum.

The high cost of development and operations, along with spiking fuel costs and a deadly 2003 crash, ultimately spelled the end for the historic jets.

“Concorde’s failure [or mitigated success] teaches us that market-orientation is crucial, and highly technological endeavors need to establish a strong feedback response system in order to be truly competitive faced with fierce competitors,” said a 2018 study by the European Commission.

Another major economic hamstring for Concorde: Its routes and speeds were severely limited when flying over land due to noise. Sonic booms may be a deal breaker for the future of high-speed flight, unless a technological solution can be found. 

X-59

In fact, NASA has partnered with Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works facility in Palmdale, California. These two aerospace giants are working on another challenge facing the success of commercial high-speed flight: sonic booms. 

They’re now developing a low-noise supersonic test demonstrator called the X-59, which is expected to begin test flights sometime this year.

NASA says its goal is to “collect and provide data to regulators that may finally solve the sonic boom challenge and open the future to commercial supersonic flight over land, reducing flight times drastically.”

• READ MORE: NASA’s Supersonic X-59 Clears Critical Ground Tests

SpaceWorks says its experience has shown that “when you look at this problem from a commercial perspective, a faster or bigger aircraft is not always better,” as Bradford put it. “The challenge here is getting the capabilities of the aircraft right such that the economic return is maximized and design point is robust to external factors.”

“Better and faster technology is cool,” he said, “but the business case should drive the design.”

The post Is Faster Always Better for Commercial Air Travel? appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

With a satchel full of years and a bucketful of good fortune, you might say I’ve been privileged to travel in style to an unconscionable degree. Much of the high life has been “purchased” with airline-mileage, hotel or credit-card rewards points—the best use for these “incentives” is to experience otherwise unattainable treats.

The St. Regis Hotel is my favorite hotel in the world. Service here is personal, not formulaic. You may hear, “May I help you, sir?” and “My pleasure, ma’am,” at a Ritz Carlton (fine properties to be sure), but not at this St. Regis. No matter what your request, it is never parried with a flat “no.” They may say: “Well, sir, I’m afraid we can’t ride motorcycles in our small lobby, but the nearest Harley dealer is nearby. May I get them on the phone?” One time, we had to wait for a room. Turns out the Israeli prime minister was a late check out from a massive suite. My wife, Cathy, and I got it—it was worth the wait.

I’ve been lucky with high-end airline travel. One time, while sitting in Delta’s Crown Room in Atlanta, I was unhappily surprised to hear, “Dr. Richard Karl, report to the service desk.” Uh-oh, what was happening to our business-class seats to Paris? “For weight-and-balance purposes, the captain has asked to have you move forward to first class.” Oh, OK! Three hours later, I smiled as an alert flight attendant asked Cathy if she’d like more caviar. Those huge maroon leather seats on that magnificent Lockheed L-1011 provided good comfort, but I can’t say I arrived in Paris feeling refreshed. Hungover was more like it.

Speaking of “crossing the pond,” I’ve had three trans-Atlantic rides on Concorde. I was solo the first time; we didn’t have enough points for Cathy, so she went a day ahead—coach! As I boarded the jet, I had one goal: get to the flight deck. When I explained to the boarding flight attendant that I’d like to visit the captain, she replied with practiced British disdain: “Most of the children do.”

I took my seat, pouting. We jolted through Mach 1. (“Just like pulling out of a train station,” the captain said.) About midway across, the flight attendant came back and invited me up. As we walked forward, you could feel the heat of the airplane—a product of air (what little there is of it at 50,000 feet) friction and high speed.

I knew I had to establish a friendship with the flight engineer as soon as I entered the flight deck if I wanted to stay more than a minute. He was kind, and I was invited back for the landing. Astoundingly close on fuel, we were momentarily sent into a hold (“For show,” my new friend assured me). After landing, we held short of a runway and watched a then-new Boeing 747-400 rotate in front of us. The captain turned to the first officer and said, “It must be like flying a bloody brick.”

Round trip on Air France’s Concorde was a different matter altogether. No chance of the cockpit, but we were treated to the sight of a wealthy couple having a lively and mean-spirited spat all the way across the ocean at Mach 2. I couldn’t help wonder: Couldn’t you cage that rage gyro until you got home?

A round-the-world first-class trip was the gift of my hosts in New Delhi, India. When the flight from Frankfurt, Germany, to India was disrupted, Delta Air Lines bought us two first-class tickets on Lufthansa. The 747 was eight hours late, but who cared? We were on the upper deck, watching a practiced flight attendant produce ribbons of fine Italian cheese from a huge round the size of a nosewheel. Got the jumpseat for that landing too. When the first officer called minimums, I couldn’t see anything in the early morning smog/haze, but the captain said only, “Continue.”

Read More from Dick Karl: Gear Up

Three years as a Part 135 charter pilot gave me a chance to see how truly wealthy people get around. Most of them were polite and friendly, but some gave off a whiff of “leave me alone.” A celebrity’s assistant would arrive in advance to be sure the water was cold and the Wi-Fi worked. Rarely did celebrities travel in anything but leisure clothing, but their appearance could be breathtaking. I heard one captain say, “I’ve flown them all, but this was the prettiest woman I’ve ever seen.” No, not J.Lo—Goldie Hawn. (“It was her smile,” he said.) My own personal best-dressed-pax prize goes to Chris Rock; that tuxedo must have cost $10,000.

But ownership of the simplest airplane beats any airline extravagance. I remember pulling into the FBO at Newark (KEWR), New Jersey, in a Cessna P210—about which I was very proud—with a passenger I had hoped to impress. The lineman sputtered: “Hey, you can’t park here. This for them jets.” So much for showing off.

When we upgraded to a Cessna 340, I really felt like I was traveling in style. Now, the taxi centerline was of importance. The airplane sat up high, and the left seat made you feel like you were the captain of a great airliner. The 340 gave way to a Piper Cheyenne, and I was burning jet-A and traveling solidly in the flight levels. The reliability of turbine engines and speeds in the 230s made possible pressurized long-distance travel.

My experience in 135 operations made single-pilot-jet ownership possible. A Beechcraft Premier was impressive, often broken, and didn’t last long thanks to a bird strike. A more-practical Cessna Citation CJ1 has graced our hangar for three years now. When I find myself drinking coffee at Flight Level 390, I can’t deny feeling I’m at the epitome of style.

It has been a rich and privileged life to be sure, but the most elegant travel I have ever experienced was long ago. As an Army captain stationed at Fort Knox, Kentucky, I bought a Beechcraft Musketeer, my first airplane. One day, I flew from Louisville to Ithaca, New York—on top, nonstop. That was the best.

This story appeared in the June/July 2021 issue of Flying Magazine

The post Tripping the Light Fantastic appeared first on FLYING Magazine.