Last Days of the Concorde

The Crash of Flight 4590 and the End of Supersonic Passenger Travel

De: Samme Chittum

Narrado por: Teri Schnaubelt

The gripping true tale of a devastating plane crash, the investigation into its causes, and the race to prevent similar disasters in the future.

On July 25, 2000, a Concorde, the world's fastest passenger plane, was taking off from Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris when it suddenly burst into flames. An airliner capable of flying at more than twice the speed of sound, the Concorde had completed 25 years of successful flights, whisking wealthy passengers - from diplomats to rock stars to corporate titans - between continents on brief and glamorous flights. Yet on this fateful day, the chartered Concorde jet, en route to America, crashed and killed all 109 passengers and crew onboard and four people on the ground. Urgent questions immediately arose as investigators scrambled to discover what had gone wrong. What caused the fire? Could it have been prevented? And, most urgently, was the Concorde safe to fly? Last Days of the Concorde addresses these issues and many more, offering a fascinating insider's look at the dramatic disaster, the hunt for clues, and the systemic overhauls that followed the crash.

©2018 Cineflix Media Inc. and Smithsonian Institution (P)2019 Tantor

Concorde, the last and one civil supersonic plane

This audiobook offers a captivating account of the Concorde crash in 2000. It delves into the investigation, the plane's history, and the individuals aboard the fateful flight. If you're a Concorde enthusiast eager to explore the world of this remarkable aircraft, I highly recommend giving this narrative a listen.

Very technical and boring

One step above the actual crash reports. Not much about the people involved. Clearly written for plane nerds. If you like technical stuff this is 5 star. I personally found it tedious and boring after the initial telling of the crash itself. Would like to have heard more about Concord in the macro not micro.

nice to have the story in one place

It's a pretty good book but I also found the constant conversion of units to be a little bit annoying. There were also more than a couple of occasions where the wrong units were used all together for example when she mentioned several thousand tons of fuel :). I've not quite sure I understand her changing voices when she was quoting men speaking. In any case it was an interesting and sometimes emotional listen that provided cohesion for information which I mostly already knew.

The history of the Concorde

Here's a rule for you... if a plane crashes and there's no survivors, the author is going to have to come up with something to fill out the book. In this case, the author uses the history of the plane as the filler. Overall it's not bad, but it repeats a ton of the same information and can get dry at times.

Overall it's like a 3-out-of-5 book, where you read it and go, meh, what's next. It's neither good or bad, it's just meh.

A Fair review

I thought I'd check this book out to see if there was any greater level of detail as to the Concord flight that famously took off in a ball of fire. Nothing much new here other than some of the investigation information and a great level of detail on the pilots and passengers - which I appreciated. In starting the book I wondered if it would be possible had they NOT gone airborne and just forced the plane back onto the ground over the runway had they stood a chance of at least some surviving the inferno. They went into that aspect of things as the post-crash analysis revealed it wouldn't have changed the outcome. Never mind that decision would have had to come against every aspect of training the pilots had and they had no information available at the time to even consider something different.