Take-off: Aerospace Bristol
Concorde — when aviation technology finally caught up with paper aeroplanes
The following article appeared in Bristol Life
It was never ‘The Concorde’; always just Concorde. As if we knew it personally.
The aircraft entered popular imagination in a way that few others have done before or since. Nearly everybody looked up if they saw this sylph flying overhead. “Look, there’s Concorde,” they’d say. Those same people would never utter the words, “Look there’s Boeing 747 Mk II”. Because, quite simply, you didn’t need to be an aero-geek to understand that Concorde was streamlined technology at its best.
Sud Aviation (later Aérospatiale) and the British Aircraft Corporation manufactured Concorde in Bristol and Toulouse, twenty aircraft in all, including prototypes.
Today, in the newly-opened Aerospace Bristol you can visit the last one ever to fly, Concorde G-BOAF (aka Alpha Foxtrot).
At Aerospace, Concorde enjoys its retirement in its own hangar. You can stare up at the elegantly sweeping lines of the aircraft and marvel at the fact that it was completed in 1969, the same year that the Ford Capri rolled off the assembly lines. And whereas classic car fans will appreciate the Capri, even the most ardent fan would scarcely praise it as a symbol of technological brilliance. But Concorde still looks like the very leading edge of modern engineering.
Flying high at twice the speed of sound
Having admired Alpha Foxtrot from every angle, you then proceed inside. It’s surprisingly cramped, although there is abundant legroom, and the seats are upholstered in soft leather. The speedometer and altimeter are frozen in time on the overhead display: Mach 2 (twice the speed of sound) and 55,000 feet.
You can’t get into the cockpit, although elsewhere there is a mock-up for those wishing to sit at the controls.
Displays at the museum feature Concorde tickets, menus, bottles of champagne, cabin crew uniforms and pictures of stars who regularly made the Concorde crossing – Sir Roger Moore, David Frost, Joan Collins (she always booked two seats so she’d have nobody sitting beside her).
Concorde — the driver's seat
Concorde was a landmark in aviation. But Filton has been involved in every aspect of the aerospace industry almost since the very beginnings of aviation.
The first powered flight took place in North Carolina in 1903 with the Wright brothers at the controls; six years later the Bristol Boxkite biplane was being built by British aviation innovators.
Aerospace Bristol pays tribute to this long history in its adjoining gallery. This is a former World Two aircraft hangar, now grade II-listed, and complete with original wooden beams and stone arches.
A little incongruously, the first exhibit you see is a somewhat run-down tram. But fear not. This isn’t a Steptoe’s yard of a museum, where anything that has been salvaged is stuck up on show — although to be fair, those sorts of museums can be fun too. At the County Louth Museum in Dundalk, I once saw an attendant take the skeleton of a Homo erectus through the tradesman's entrance. But more of that another time.
Back to transport.
There’s a very good reason for a tram's presence at Aerospace Bristol. The Bristolian entrepreneur Sir George White, son of a painter-decorator and a lady’s maid, set up shop here early in the 20th century. He produced his first tram in 1903 — not exactly A Streetcar Named Desire, more of a streetcar named, oh alright then.
Le Moulin Rouge in Paris by Toulouse Lautrec. Bristol man George White was in Paris on a fact-finding mission — he appears to have uncovered at least two
Once the tram-making business was well underway, George decided to go to Paris. Who wouldn't in the early years of the 20th century? This was the era of the Belle Époque. The birthplace of modern art and the seat of challenging literature, this was the Paris of Renoir, Matisse, Satie, Dufy, and the Lumiere Brothers.
The cafes and nightclubs of the Left Bank were going at le full throttle; the restaurant founded by César Ritz was playing host to Europe’s great, good and up-for-it citizens. Clubs, bars, glitzy restaurants — the full Montmartre.
To be fair to George White, he was there to see the trams (excellent system in Paris, btw). He also wanted to see a couple chaps name of Wright.
The Bristol man was duly impressed by their aeronautical display, almost as excited by the demonstration of their flying machine as he was by equally formidable demonstrations later that evening in *Le Club des Mesdames et Messieurs de Tres Rigueur et Voluptueux. (*For all we know.)
At any rate, in 1910 George White announced that his Bristol Tramways and Carriage Company would diversify into aircraft. Within a few months, the factory was building the Bristol biplane known as the Boxkite. Four years later World War I had broken out and the British Colonial Aeroplane Company (BCAC) was providing the government with reconnaissance and fighter planes.
Since then warplanes, helicopters, missiles, satellites, rockets have been built in Filton by myriad companies.
The Harrier Jump Jet — made in Bristol from 1967 onwards (image: Aerospace Bristol)
In the hangar you’ll see a huge cross-section of the aeronautical output of this area — including a 1916 Bristol Fighter, a Sea Harrier jet fighter famous for its vertical take off, the Bristol Britannia bomber and the Bloodhound Missile. You will not be the first to muse that nothing speeds up technology quite as much as war.
After the Second World War, the car division of the Bristol Aeroplane Company was formed, later becoming Bristol Cars Limited.
Transports of delight — the 1953 Bristol 403 saloon car (image: Aerospace Bristol)
Aerospace Bristol puts aviation history into context. Wilbur Wright was born 150 years ago in 1867. In 1903, along with his brother Orville, he heralded in the era of flight. From that very first no-frills flight in North Carolina— shorter that the wing span of a 747 — air travel flowered, culminating with the moon landings. It’s an astounding fact that Neil Armstrong, the first man on the moon, Yuri Gagarin the first man in space, and Orville Wright were all alive at the same time.
Aviation technology was revolutionised in the 20th century, and by the 21st century air travel had become commonplace. Aerospace Bristol is probably the top place to sit back and mull over this extraordinary achievement. It's now open and ready for boarding.
The Wright stuff. The Bristol Scout began manufacture in 1914, just 11 years after the very first powered flight