British Air says Virgin bid for Concorde won't fly LONDON (Reuters) =97 British Airways spurned a five million pound ($8.4=20 million) bid for its Concorde aircraft from rival Virgin Atlantic Airways=20 Sunday, and said it would retire the supersonic jet as planned in October.= =20 "Concorde is not for sale. Our position is absolutely unchanged on that," a= =20 British Airways (BA) spokeswoman told Reuters. "We're clear that Concorde=20 will not fly commercially beyond October 2003." Earlier Sunday, Virgin=20 raised its bid for BA's five remaining Concorde aircraft to five million=20 pounds from its previous offer of just five pounds ($9). "We have operators= =20 ready to help us keep it flying and would serve New York, Barbados and=20 Dubai, a new destination for the plane," Virgin Chairman Richard Branson=20 said in a statement. A joint British-French venture, Concorde first took=20 off in 1969 and can fly at twice the speed of sound, or around 1,300 miles= =20 per hour. But despite cutting trans-Atlantic journeys to three hours, demand for the= =20 high-priced service has fallen in recent years, while the costs of=20 operating the fleet have sharply risen. The famous hooked-nosed jet was=20 also dealt a heavy blow in 2000 by a crash shortly after take-off in Paris= =20 that killed 113 people. The planes were grounded for more than a year=20 afterward. Air France, the only other airline to fly Concorde, stopped=20 commercial flights last month. If snubbed, Virgin said it would ask BA to=20 join it in forming a charitable trust that would keep at least two of the=20 supersonic planes in semi-commercial service. Virgin pledged to donate 1=20 million pounds toward the trust. But the BA spokeswoman said it was not=20 feasible to continue commercial flights because Airbus, the aircraft=20 manufacturer that supplies Concorde's spare parts, has said it would not=20 support them beyond October. "As the aircraft gets older it costs more and= =20 more to maintain and therefore its just not viable," she said. BA said it=20 was still finalizing its plans for the aircraft following its retirement.=20 "One of the things we're considering is the feasibility of keeping one=20 aircraft flying for airshows or special occasions such as the Queen's=20 birthday or events similar to last year's Golden Jubilee," the spokeswoman= =20 said. *************************************************** The owner of Roger's Trinbago Site/TnTisland.com Roj (Roger James) escape email mailto:ejames@xxxxxxxxx Trinbago site: www.tntisland.com Carib Brass Ctn site www.tntisland.com/caribbeanbrassconnection/ Steel Expressions www.mts.net/~ejames/se/ Mas Site: www.tntisland.com/tntrecords/mas2003/ Site of the Week: http://www.carib-link.net/naparima/naps.html TnT Webdirectory: http://search.co.tt *********************************************************