Concorde’s Birthday

CONCORDE, the world’s fastest passenger plane, will soon be over 33 years old. It first __51__ on 2 March 1969 in France. Concorde was developed by both France and Britain. From 1956 these two countries had a _52__ of a supersonic passenger plane. In 1962 they started to __53__ together on the project. The plane __54_ over 1.5 billion pounds to develop. It is the most tested plane in the history. It was given over 5000 hours of testing. Concorde flies at twice the speed of _55__. This means that it _56_ only 3 hours 25 minutes to fly between London and New York, compare with 7—8 hours in other passenger jets. Because of the five-hour time difference between the USA and Britain, it is _57__ to travel west on Concorde and arrive in New York before you leave London! You can catch the 10:30a.m. _58__ from London, Heathrow and start work in New York an hour _59_! Concorde is much used by business people and film stars. Each Concorde is built at a cost of 55 million pounds. Twenty have been built so far. Air France and British Airway _60_ the most. They each have seven planes.

1.A. invented    B. produced    C. flew      D. took off

2.A. talk        B. dream      C. meeting   D. fight

3.A. work       B. do         C. carry      D. finish

4.A. paid        B. wanted     C. needed     D. cost

5.A. voice       B. sound      C. noise      D. shout

6.A. spends      B. takes       C. covers     D. travels

7.A. possible     B. impossible   C. real       D. unreal

8.A. plane       B. passenger    C. flight      D. airline

9.A. later        B. late         C. earlier      D. early

10.A. build       B. make      C. sell        D. own