Pinnacle Of Air Travel, Air France Concord At JFK Shortly Before Fatal End Of SuperSonic Era - IMRAN®

Pinnacle Of Air Travel, Air France Concord At JFK Shortly Before Fatal End Of SuperSonic Era - IMRAN®  

Twenty‑five years ago, I captured this stunning Air France Concorde at JFK Airport in Queens — the gateway to my forever American hometown, Manhattan, New York. Behind it, you can see the massive construction work that defined that era. JFK’s Terminal 4 was undergoing its full reconstruction from the late 1990s until its opening in 2001, and anyone who drove in and out of the airport during those years remembers the chaos well.

I shot this from a Boeing 747, never imagining how close we were to a turning point in aviation history. Just months later, in July 2000, Air France Flight 4590 suffered the only fatal Concorde accident in the aircraft’s 27‑year service life. The world's only faster—than-sound passenger fleet returned to service briefly in 2001, but by 2003 the supersonic age had come to a quiet close.

I never got the chance to fly on Concorde — a regret that grows every time I look at this photo. It remains a reminder of a time when commercial aviation dared to break the rules of speed, design, and imagination.

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