two tun,
Now assuming that A/F had the flat tyre mod fitted, and it was mandatory, and that system was working, any flat tyre below 134 kts would have ben indicated to the crew and the T/OFF would have been abandoned. I believe the aircraft rotated early at about 185 kts so I assume the tyre was wrecked some where between 134 and 185 kts, which is not very big in the time scale of the event and an earlier tyre deflation not likely
If the aircraft had all 4 engines working an early rotation of that extent would have made it difficult to obtain correct flying speed in the total time of the flight, but yes it would have been more possible.
During the first 5 to 6 years of Concorde's operation BA and A/F had a lot of trouble with tyre burst during T/OFF [reason for flat tyre mod] and in the case of BA I do not remember one where the engine did not ingest the tyre. I have experienced three such incidents and in all cases ingestion took place, and the vibration whilst the tyre was being consumed was very bad, and the N2 dropped to 70 % before recovery. Now if the engine had a fire warning and the tower had said thare were large flames from the rear of the aircraft I too might have been tempted to shut the engine down.
Yes in the latter part of the flight controlability seemed to have been a problem and it is suggest that this was due to low airspeed, but just consider where the flames were and the proximity to the inboard powered flying control [ a point were all three hyds system came together], then if the flames melted the hyd pipes all three systems would be lost. On Concorde with no hyds the is NO control of the aircraft and it would pitch nose up and possibly with assymetric thrust turn over.
Yes I am sure that the A/F crew would if they could do things different if the situation repeated itself, but I am sure they adapted the SOPs to suit the situation they were in .No SOP no matter how well written fits every incident and sometimes they have to be modified.
In my opinion the crew could have done every thing correctly according to SOPs and the flight was still doomed once that fire started,and their only chance was to land straight ahead, but there they did not know that at the time and did the best they could
Regards Brit 312