Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2003/12/31
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]HST is interesting. Whilst I was a member of the H G Wells society at Imperial College, where I was a student 1969-1971. Barnes Wallis gave a lecture annually and in one of them he explained his design and theory behind the HST. His argument was that Australia and New Zealand were the only nations the British could trust so a plane needed designing which could fly between us fast and non stop :-) He was, as always, way ahead of his time technically. Frank On Wednesday, December 31, 2003, at 02:17 am, Marc James Small wrote: > At 06:12 AM 12/30/03 +0000, Frank Dernie wrote: >> It is possibly the development costs which they were talking about, >> but >> I don't think it ever made a profit - maybe the information you read >> is >> true and that which I read is not but I think not. If they were making >> a handsome profit why did they stop? >> All the information I heard was that Air France never made any money >> flying it and BA only on the New York route. > > Well, check your back-files of THE ECONOMIST for discussion, as they > have > covered CONCORDE in great detail since 1967 when it was first a > reality. > The UK and France wrote off development costs around 1980 which > allowed BA > to claim a profit (never a "handsome" profit, mind you!) for its > operational life. I have no information, and no interest, in Air > France, > so I cannot comment on their (probably hamfisted) operation of the SST. > > The CONCORDE was grounded due to its age and for no other reason. The > opposition of the US to the CONCORDE was only sour grapes, as our > Congress > refused to fund the Boeing SST. When this occured, the US government > immediately went into hull defilade and has never given the CONCORDE an > opportunity to succeed, even going so far as to pressure foreign > governments in South-West Asia and Canada to deny the CONCORDE > overflight > rights to ensure that no Europe-to-Asia routes were possible -- and > that is > where the profits really could be found! > > Now, the US is proposing a hupersonic transport (HST), a suborbital > craft > which could do Vancouver-to-Sydney in under three hours and the > Atlantic in > less than an hour. The Europeans are also working on such an HST. If > the > US welches out and the Europeans build it, once again, the US will > attempt > to kill it, an awful thing for my government to do. > > If the HST works, though, us smokers might be more inclined to fly > overseas, albeit Heathrow and Dulles D Terminal are the only > "smokers-be-damned" airports I have ever been forced to pass through. > > Marc > > > Marc > > msmall@infionline.net FAX: +540/343-7315 > Cha robh bąs fir gun ghrąs fir! > > > -- > To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html > - -- To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html