The Concorde accident

2000-07-25

On a Tuesday in July 2000 the first fatal accident involving a Concorde aircraft occurred with Air France Concorde 203, F-BTSC (flight 4590) leaving from Paris-Charles de Gaulle to New York. It crashed a minute after take-off as a result of a tyre blowout, which caused a fuel tank to rupture. This started a sequence of events that caused a fire which eventually lead to 2 engines failing and the aircraft crashing killing all 109 people (100 passengers and 9 crew members) on board. Four people in a local hotel on the ground were also killed. At 1,6 km down the runway pieces of tyre, a water deflector and fuel tank were found along with a 40-cm long thin metal strip, which did not come from the Concorde.