A Concorde jet has been floated down the Hudson River in New York after months of refurbishments.
The retired British Airways plane was stored in the Intrepid Museum in Manhattan after supersonic flights came to an end in 2003 and it was taken away for restoration last August.
According to the museum, which exhibits exceptional sea, air and spacecraft, the repair work included “removal of the aircraft’s paint coating, sanding, and recoating, using the same colours and markings that made Concorde a true aviation legend”.
On Wednesday, the renovated jet was floated on a barge down towards Weeks Marine in New Jersey. By the following afternoon, it had made its way back to the museum, before being lifted by a 90-metre crane.
The British Airways Concorde holds the record for the fastest transatlantic crossing by a passenger aircraft, at 2 hours 52 minutes and 59 seconds from London Heathrow to JFK airport in New York.
The Concorde was the only supersonic commercial jet to fly internationally and had a top speed of 1,354mph. Flights were between three and a half to four hours long. Today’s large airliners fly at about 600mph, and a London to New York flight takes eight hours on average.
The Intrepid Museum’s website says: “The Concorde is a product of Anglo-French cooperation. When the Concorde entered Air France and British Airways’ transatlantic service in 1976, it was the only operational supersonic passenger transport in the world.
“With a crew of nine, the Concorde could fly at 1,350 mph (2,150 km/h) at an altitude of 60,000 ft (18,181 metres), high enough for its 100 passengers to see the Earth’s curvature.”
Public tours of the jet will resume on 4 April, museum officials said.
