Fifth month of the project: Planning for Concorde and the Airlines

We are now in the fifth month of the project, and progress is ongoing! The series on Bristol Type aircraft is almost complete and work is beginning on the Airbus series, as well as continuing on the material for Concorde 50 archive open afternoons.

Last month’s open afternoon was themed around the development of Concorde, which allowed for a lot of very early Concorde documents to be put on show, and this month’s will be on one of my favourite aspects of the Concorde archive material – Concorde and Airline sales pitches. On display will be a number of documents from the late 1960s and early 1970s showing the attempts to sell Concorde to various worldwide airlines.

Which brings us to the most interesting find of the month!

Most interesting find of the month:

The items this month are two I came across again while planning material for the upcoming open afternoon.

The first item is from a booklet of “Concorde Facts” and highlights some of the advantages of Concorde. This graph comparing a flight to the US on Concorde and a flight to the US in a subsonic jet shows how the difference in flight time actually splits up into in-flight activity for the passenger.

(Image credit: BAE Systems)

Whereas this booklet shows how different airlines’ Concorde liveries might look.

(Image credit: BAE Systems)

This material allows a look into what might have happened if every airline with an option on Concorde had gone through with their purchase, and gives an interesting look into the “what if” scenario.

Finally, if the sound of the Concorde and the Airlines open archive afternoon sounds intriguing, please come along! Your normal museum ticket will cover entry and the archive reading room will be open from 1:30pm until 3:30pm on Thursday the 21st of February, so drop in any time in that window to see material on display for that afternoon only.