Branson steps up bid to keep Concorde airborne

Sir Richard Branson will step up his efforts to save Concorde this week by urging the Trade and Industry Secretary Patricia Hewitt to intervene personally to prevent the supersonic jet being grounded by British Airways in October.

The Virgin Atlantic chairman and his Concorde "team", made up of former Concorde pilots, engineers and commercial staff, will also meet the aircraft's manufacturer Airbus to persuade it to provide continued maintenance and technical support.

Sir Richard is expected to speak to Ms Hewitt today or tomorrow to outline his business case for keeping Concorde in the air and to obtain clarification about its ownership and what rights, if any, the Government has to instruct BA to hand over its fleet to another operator.

"The more we dig, the more we feel Concorde should not be grounded," said Sir Richard. "It is purely a move by BA to get rid of a big chunk of overheads and persuade more people to fly with it first class. That is fair enough from the point of view of BA's shareholders but it is not fair when BA was given Concorde to operate on behalf of the country."

Sir Richard's Concorde team is five to six strong and is understood to include Jack Lowe, the plane's longest-serving pilot and its former commercial director. Other former Concorde pilots and engineers who have retired from BA but are still eligible to fly the plane have also offered their services as have other ex-commercial directors.

Airbus said last week that it would not be viable for another airline to take over Concorde because it could not provide pilot training or back up.

But Sir Richard said that under a 1962 Anglo-French Treaty signed when development work on Concorde began, Airbus had an obligation to provide maintenance and support if another British airline wanted to take the plane over.

Sir Richard, whose Virgin Atlantic is a launch customer for the Airbus A380 super jumbo and the stretched Airbus A430-600 long-range jet, said: "I believe I will be able to cajole Airbus into providing continued support."

BA maintains that it is no longer commercially viable to operate Concorde and says that, far from having been handed the aircraft for £1, it paid the manufacturer £155m plus a further £16.5m for the spares inventory and has since invested £1bn in its fleet of seven aircraft.

Sir Richard says he believes the £155m purchase price was funded by a Government loan, which was subsequently written off when BA was privatised, while the £1bn investment compares with £1.75bn in revenues, meaning that BA has made a £750m profit from Concorde over the years.

If his bid to keep Concorde in the air is successful, Virgin Atlantic would operate three aircraft and reduce the schedule in line with demand from passengers. But it would want to have access to the full 14 aircraft operated by BA and Air France in order to cannibalise them for spares, as the two existing operators have.

Referring to BA's plans to dispose of Concorde to museums around the world and auction some of its fixtures and fittings, Sir Richard said: "Ms Hewitt has got to stop this jumble sale at least until there have been proper discussions. Concorde is like a great work of art and should be saved for the country. If we can have access to the full fleet it ought to be still flying in 20 years."