The Last Concorde

I sat and watched the last Concorde take off from New York that morning in October, 2003. Although it was dark in Texas (I had just been gazing at the cloudless, starry sky a few moments before), the sun was coming up there.

The long-nosed, delta-wing jet sat at the end of the runway, scheduled to leave at 7:35 ET. The CNN news anchor started cracking jokes ("It's not going so fast now, is it?") as the time came and went. With a crass looking, well-that-didn't-work-so-well grin on her face, she turned it over to the stock market weather report.

They sit in their studios under the bright lights, behind cameras, caked in makeup, reading their scripts, and they really seem to think that the world runs on their schedules. And when things are off by a minute or so (it took off fewer than 200 seconds later), it's evidently entertaining enough to them that they think they need to share their smug comments with us.

So I sat and watched the last Concorde take off on time that morning. The television camera followed it rolling down the runway, followed it as the long nose began to point skyward, followed it as it climbed into the air, as it banked left over the water, as the city passed underneath its wings.

Then they broke for a commercial.

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