Paris commentary

JUST two days before the twenty‐fifth International Air and Space Show opened at Le Bourget, public attention was drawn in dramatic fashion to supersonic transports, and the British Aircraft Corporation/Sud‐Aviation Concord in particular, when Pan American World Airways announced their decision to purchase six Concord airliners. Although it has been assumed that both Air France and British Overseas Airways Corporation will adopt the Concord, and it is believed that Panair do Brasil and Finnair have similar intentions, the Pan American announcement became the first public statement of an intention to purchase supersonic transports.