Fascinating colorised images have been released of Concorde's birth to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the supersonic aircraft's first non-stop crossing of the Atlantic, from Washington DC to Paris in a record-breaking time of three hours and 33 minutes on the 26th of September, 1973.

Images released by Topfoto show men hard at work on the plane, flight attendants lined up in front of the famous aircraft and you even meet the two pilots who test-flew the prototype, Mr Andre Turcat and Brian Trubshaw.

Concorde's first flight took place on the 2nd of March, 1969, with the 001 prototype taking off from Toulouse in France. When the French test pilot landed Concorde for the first time, he simply said: 'The big bird flies…'

The British-made 002 prototype flew from Bristol's Filton Airfield in the UK a few weeks later. Both models were displayed at the Paris Air Show in June of the same year.

During the first non-stop crossing of the Atlantic on the 26th of September, 1973, the supersonic passenger aircraft flew at an average speed of 954mph to Paris-Orly Airport.

This flight brought to an end a publicity tour of North and South America designed to convince reluctant airline companies to buy the aircraft.

The visit also coincided with the opening of Dallas Fort Worth Airport, Texas, on the 22nd of September, 1973, where Concorde touched down on American soil for the first time.

Jointly designed and built by the French and British governments, with hundreds of private companies involved as subcontractors and suppliers, the planes were bought and run by British Airways and Air France.

Commercial flights to Bahrain started in 1976, but regular flights to New York did not start until 1977. In Britain, the development of Concorde was originally the responsibility of the Ministry of Aviation, with links to many other government departments, each of which had a Concorde Division working under a Directing Committee.

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