In 2003 Tony Benn recalled that first flight:
On April 9 1969 I went to Filton for the first test flight of the British Concorde. The French had had a huge roll-out, with great panache, but typically for Britain, we just treated Concorde as another aircraft. That first flight was hilarious. It was just like a village cricket match. There was Sir George Edwards, the chairman of British Aircraft Corporation, in his pork-pie hat, pacing up and down waiting for the flight to take place and muttering, "It's these chaps in the backroom who are causing the trouble." Finally, Brian Trubshaw, the test pilot, came out, and people waved at him as if he was going out to bat. "Good old Trubby!", that kind of thing. But, of course, when Trubby came out and got into the plane and it boomed into the air, the vibration was so great, I felt I was being filleted; as if the flesh was falling off my backbone.