Air France Flight 4590 crash and possible remedies. Air France's Concorde operation had been a money-losing venture, but it is claimed that the aeroplane had been kept in service as a matter of national pride; British Airways claimed to make a profit on its Concorde operations. According to Jock Lowe, a Concorde pilot, up until the crash of Air France Flight 4590 at Paris, the British Airways Concorde operation made a net average profit of about £30m a year. Commercial service was resumed in November 2001 after a £17m safety improvement service, until the remaining aircraft were retired in 2003. The official investigation was
Concorde to operate Concorde at a profit, in spite of very high maintenance costs, because the aircraft was able to sustain a high ticket price. Among other destinations, Concorde flew regular transatlantic flights from London's Heathrow Airport and Paris's Charles de Gaulle Airport to John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York, Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia, and Grantley Adams International Airport in Barbados; it flew these routes in less than half the time of other airliners. Concorde won the 2006 Great British Design Quest organised by the BBC and the Design Museum, beating other well-known designs such as the