ChristiaanJ
There is THIS link from Gordon Roxborough's superb 'ConncordeSST site'
CONCORDE SST : 10th Anniversary
As you can see the event occured on Christmas Eve in 1985. As you can see from the video, Capt John Hutchinson was also aboard G-BOAG as a commentator, the F/O being John 'Noj' White. (After leaving the fleet when he got his command, Noj eventually returned to Concorde many years later as Capt Noj).
At the bottom of the web page I am 99% sure that Gordon got it wrong when he said that the reason that there were only 6 aircraft for the Boxing day 'group photo' was that the seventh aircraft was in the paint shop. I was there when we did the photo shoot, and I am pretty sure the only reason we never had aircraft 7 was that it was in JFK.
CAAAD
Dude - I think basic engine hardware was in good supply, but there were concerns about the control amplifier component availability.
I wouldn't be at all surprised (the Ultra ECA was a real steam powered piece of kit) but we always managed to get obsolete/obsolescent electron component somewhow. I remember when we test flew the Plessey (I think) digital ECA on G-BBDG in the late 1970's it was a fraction of the size, ran cooler and the engine parameters were more stable too. Such a pity that we never went down that road for the production aircraft.
Regards
Dude
