PLANTING THE SUPERSONIC SEED

BEFORE CONCORDE French projects

As British manufacturers were proposing concepts for a supersonic transport, so their French counterparts were thinking along similar lines. Concorde would prove it made sense to join forces — but not before France’s aviation industry had demonstrated cutting-edge design innovation, including a nuclear-powered ‘Super Caravelle’

PART TWO

At the 1961 Paris Air Show, Sud-Aviation lifted the veil off its Super Caravelle with this attractive model
VIA JEAN-CHRISTOPHE CARBONEL

In France the initial impetus to build a supersonic airliner came from the aircraft manufacturers. In the vanguard was the Toulouse branch of the design office of SNCASO, the Société Nationale des Constructions Aéronautiques du Sud-Ouest, led by technical director André Vaultier. Its interest in an SST began in late 1957.

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