Konkordski
Thursday, 20th September 2007 by James Turnbull
The Tupolev Tu-144 is a supersonic passenger jet built by the Soviet Union as a competitor to the British/French Concorde.
The Tupolev was developed around the same time as Concorde and, with a little help from a spy in France, its appearance is very similar. Due to this, the Western papers of the day gave it the inspired nickname of "Konkordski"1.
Konkordski 77107 on display at Kazan Aviation Production Complex
Like its namesake, Konkordski wasn't the aviation success everyone had hoped for, and only 17 were ever built. A disastrous crash in 1973 at the Paris Air show sealed the Konkordski's fate and they served only 103 domestic flights before being withdrawn from service.
Konkordski 77108 stored at the Samara-Ouchebny Research Institute
Although nowhere near as famous as Concorde, Konkordski did achieve its share of records: it was the first supersonic passenger jet to fly (just 2 months before Concorde) and to this day is still the fastest commercial airliner ever!
More info on the History of Konkordski, full aircraft list and Wikipedia page.
Thanks to Snoogans and Virtual Globetrotting.
The feminine form certainly would not be “Konkordcki”, but “Konkordzka” (Polish) or “Konkordskaya” (Russian).
I did want to point you to a place where Concorde and Konkordski can be seen side by side: The Technik Museum in Sinsheim, Germany (http://www.museum-sinsheim.de). However although I can see both planes together in the flesh, the Google Earth photos are hopelessly out of date 🙁 Here’s the Museum View Placemark but unfortunately you don’t see the planes yet.
The Concorde was used by both Air France and British Airways. Was it the same thing for the TU-144? I mean, was it used by a specific airline (Aeroflot maybe)?
Ralph – Aeroflot was the only user.
Peter, are you sure? I looked on the video and the plane’s livery doesn’t look like Aeroflot at all.
Tu-144 has not been sold to any other company than Aeroflot. There was only 16 airworthy Tu-144 (1 prototype, 1 pre-prod and 14 prod). 2 crashed : one during a show in Le Bourget (as you said) and one during qualification flights.
Tu-144 has been in service from 1977 to 1978 with passengers and from 1975 to 1980 for cargo.
And the story of the espionage has been contradicted even by Mr Turcat, chief test pilot on Concorde… The fact is that a 100 passengers plane flying at Mach 2+ have to have this kind of overall form and same kind of technical solution. For experts Concorde and Tu-144 are VERY different 😉
BTW there are 2 more Tu-144 viewable in Yahoo in Zhukowskitest base 😉
FlashEarth direct link : -> http://www.flashearth.com/?lat=55.570771&lon=38.153327&z=16.5&r=0&src=yh
“Ouchebny” on russian is Educational.
Samara-Ouchebny Research Institute > Samara Research and Education Institute.