Air France engineers' missed spacer repair doomed Concorde flight 4590

The documentary 'Concorde Crash: Days That Shocked The World' examined the Air France Flight 4590 disaster that occurred in July 2000 at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport, resulting in 113 fatalities. The program presented the official investigation's findings regarding the cause of the crash, but according to the review, it omitted significant alternative theories that challenge the completeness of this official account.

The official investigation, as presented in the documentary, concluded that the crash was triggered by a piece of twisted titanium found on the runway. This metal fragment had fallen from a DC10 aircraft that had taken off minutes earlier. When the Concorde's wheel ran over this debris during takeoff, a tire exploded with tremendous force. The explosion was powerful enough to rupture the fuel tank, and the leaking fuel was then ignited by the intense heat from the engines. This sequence of events caused sheets of flame to roar from the two engines on the left wing, leaving the aircraft unable to generate sufficient thrust to stay airborne. The plane subsequently dropped from the sky, killing all 100 passengers and nine crew members on board, as well as four people on the ground.

The documentary included emotional testimony from those affected by the tragedy. Francine Quignon-Fleuret, the daughter of flight engineer Gilles Jardinaud, shared her personal grief. She explained that her father was on his final trip before retirement and had been immensely proud to be a new grandfather. She described how she learned of her father's death through news reports, a common experience among the bereaved families. The image of the burning aircraft, with heat haze shimmering around its white delta wings, appeared on newspaper front pages worldwide and continues to cause her heartache.

However, the review strongly criticizes the documentary for presenting only half of the story. It points to investigative work by British journalist David Rose, who uncovered that Air France engineers had serviced the plane four days before the fatal flight and failed to replace a critical component known as a spacer. This spacer was essential for keeping the wheels in proper alignment. Without it, the aircraft wobbled on the runway, a condition compared to a faulty supermarket trolley. Evidence of this instability was visible in the sooty tire tracks left along the tarmac, which the documentary showed but did not explain. The review argues that this maintenance failure was a crucial piece of context that the program should have addressed, as it suggests the disaster might have been preventable and that the official narrative focusing solely on runway debris is incomplete.