Will probably get back to Udvar Hazy Center one more time while drooling on organizing a trip to check these.
I have a soft spot for all three...
- Concorde - always struggling financially, then the accident, then once everything got lined back up together and ready to excel - eventually killed because 40% of the CEOs that were actually willing and able to authorize a Concorde ticket expense perished in a single day in a single event in September of 2001. Their replacements had the same powers, but would actually hold on such expenses as they were - well - replacements.
- Concordski - got a head start thanks to sound engineering and very sound industrial espionage, then slowed down by the espionage being discovered and poisoned data being fed (the "secret" tires composition formulas fed by the DGSE to the Soviets was apparently a variation of chewing gum with enough extra crap to make it worth wasting time on, but eventually - still chewing gum). Then the pride of the air show, then the humiliation of it crashing in front of the World killing the crew and several people on the ground. Covered up by both the French and the Soviets into a "The cameraman dropped his camera, which got locked under the stick, which caused the plane to go into a nosedive".
The story goes that a Mirage flew our from Strasbourg to take pictures of the canards of the Tu144 from the top. The Soviets were not informed. As the Mirage was finishing and getting away, it was noticed by the pilots, and they savagely pushed the stick to avoid it (not knowing it was flying away already). This caused "the mother of all bunts" (quoting from old archives here, as I agree :) ), flameouts, and the irony - the pilots recovered, but the frame didn't hold on recovery and the plane broke in pieces.
So the cover up was - the French didn't want to go too much in details on why they'd send Mirages from 550km away to officially "Photograph Le Bourget's parking structures", which would fly above other planes startling the pilots, and the Soviets didn't much want to explain why their prime airplane broke in pieces on an event that was hard, but not typically hard enough to make a frame brake.
- Buran - I pity this guy the most. All that was ever said about it was that it was a copy of the Shuttle, and no one ever batted an eyelid that it did land on its own, automatically, in30kn crosswinds with 40kn gusts.
PS: All my Conkordski info is from a French documentary that I saw in the early 2000's. Not sure if it would be easy to find but if available - it's a great watch.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
