Originally Posted by BahrainLad
Can we have some facts here?
1. The aircraft was not overweight. In the taxi from the terminal, the aircraft had burned down to MTOW.
2. The 'tailwind' was actually a crosswind, and would have negligible effect on the aircraft.
3. The missing spacer is irrelevant. The aircraft rolled straight and true until the tyre explosion. The resulting fuel leak caused a surge in the no.1&2 engine which necessitated a left rudder input from the aircraft commander (this is clear from the FDR)
4. There was no 'early rotation'. The aircraft rotated at VR in accordance with standard procedures.
5. The shutdown of No. 2 was done outside of normal procedures (climb and stablise before shutdown) however the conclusion of the BEA and British AAIB is that it would have likely failed anyway 60-90 seconds later. It is highly unlikely that an extra minute of thrust from No. 2 would have saved the aircraft; it was already well below the minimum speed for the configuration it was in (2 engine climbouts on a 4-engined aircraft with the gear down rarely end well....)
Thanks for the sanity. Facts and jingoism don't always go together. I am surprised that the ultimate excuse of the (US) insurance companies wasn't used "if the Concorde had canceled the flight that day, none of this would have happened...but since it wasn't, AF must be partly to blame"
However, this tyre burst was far violent than any experienced before (or ever imagined) and the reason it was so violent is because CO fitted an aluminium part in place of a titanium one.
Draw from that your own conclusions as to their culpability.
I think you meant to say titanium in place of aluminum.
But that replacement by itself does not make CO necessarily culpable. There is nothing in the aviation regulations that say you cannot use a specific metal/alloy. For example, if a manufacturer decides to use a titanium fitting to ensure that the engine cowling does not fall off in bird strikes, then it is a good thing not a bad one. All that is needed is that the design and testing be sufficiently done to ensure that you are not increasing the threat to others due to that change.
Where the culpability comes in is IF the part was used in a situation that increased the chances of the part falling out and endangering others either due to insufficient design and/or testing or the process of assembling/maintaining it was flawed. The public information suggests so far that the part was not FAR approved which to me is very strange since one cannot even use a simple rivet or screw that isn't FAR approved on a plane. So it is a good thing to investigate how this part came to be on that plane and whether using it had increased the chances of it falling off and potentially endangering others. This is no different from someone using a non aviation certified bolt that sheared off and dropped a part on the runaway that had catastrophic consequences on the plane behind it.
Where the culpability of the Concorde design comes in is if either they should have protected themselves from that kind of debris on runways (i.e., there was reasonable expectation of finding Titanium pieces on runways besides pot holes) or whether they should have protected the fuel tanks from all kinds of disintegration of the tires regardless of the reason. It would appear that the report faults the Concorde design on the latter but not the former which I think is reasonable. This culpability is not removed by simply saying that if CO hadn't used the Titanium piece, then none of this would have happened.