[1] Whilst taking off from Charles de Gaulle Airport, Air France Flight 4590 ran over debris on the runway dropped by an aircraft during the preceding departure, causing a tyre to explode and disintegrate.

Tyre fragments, launched upwards at great speed by the rapidly spinning wheel, violently struck the underside of the wing, damaging parts of the landing gear – thus preventing its retraction – and causing the integral fuel tank to rupture.

[3]: 166 [BEA 1] Air traffic controller Gilles Logelin noticed the flames before the Concorde was airborne and informed the flight crew.

The plane did not gain enough airspeed with the three remaining engines as damage to the landing gear bay door prevented the retraction of the undercarriage.

The aircraft struck the ground left wing low after a heading change of nearly 180°, crashing into the Hôtelissimo Les Relais Bleus Hotel.

[12][13][14] The crew tried to divert to nearby Paris–Le Bourget Airport, but accident investigators stated that a safe landing would have been highly unlikely, given the aircraft's flightpath.

[26] Commercial service was resumed on 7 November 2001, after a £17M (£29M today) safety improvement programme, until the type was retired between May (Air France) and October (British Airways), 2003.

[31] The BEA concluded that: Former British Airways Concorde captain John Hutchinson said the fire on its own should have been 'eminently survivable; the pilot should have been able to fly his way out of trouble'.

"[4] While examining the wreckage in a warehouse, investigators noticed that a spacer was missing from the bogie beam on the left-hand main landing gear.

Photographs in the BEA report showed a smashed steel landing light, clipped by the aircraft, parts of which were probably ingested by engine number 1.

They re-evaluated two factors that the BEA had found to be of negligible consequence to the crash, the unbalanced weight distribution in the fuel tanks and the loose landing gear.

Chauve and Suaud gave detailed calculations, stating that without the retardation caused by the missing undercarriage spacer, the aircraft would have taken off 1684 metres from the start of the runway, before the point where the metal strip was located, although the BEA disputed this, saying the acceleration was normal.

At one point, it drifted toward a just-landed Air France Boeing 747 that was carrying then-French President Jacques Chirac (who was returning from the 26th G8 summit meeting in Okinawa, Japan).

Analysis of test results revealed that this occurring could release sufficient kinetic energy to cause the fuel tank to rupture.

[3]: 115 The accident led to modifications to Concorde, including more-secure electrical controls, Kevlar lining to the fuel tanks, and specially developed burst-resistant tyres.

[43] Just before service resumed, the September 11 attacks took place, resulting in a marked drop in passenger numbers, and contributing to the eventual end of Concorde flights.

[48] In March 2008, Bernard Farret, a deputy prosecutor in Pontoise, outside Paris, asked judges to bring manslaughter charges against Continental Airlines and two of its employees – John Taylor, the mechanic who replaced the wear strip on the DC-10, and his manager Stanley Ford – alleging negligence in the way the repair was carried out.

[49][52][53] It was alleged that Perrier, Hérubel, and Frantzen knew that the plane's fuel tanks could be susceptible to damage from foreign objects, but nonetheless allowed it to fly.

The court ruled that the crash resulted from a piece of metal from a Continental jet that was left on the runway; the object punctured a tyre on the Concorde and then ruptured a fuel tank.

[55][56][57] The convictions were overturned by a French appeals court in November 2012, thereby clearing Continental (which had merged with United Airlines by then) and Taylor of criminal responsibility.

As Air France had paid out €100 million to the families of the victims, Continental could be made to pay its share of that compensation payout.

[59] Another monument, a 6,000-square-metre (65,000 sq ft) memorial surrounded with topiary planted in the shape of a Concorde, was established in 2006 at Mitry-Mory, just south of Charles de Gaulle Airport.