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Photos: Air France Concorde crash trial begins

Air France Concorde flight 4590 takes off from Charles de Gaulle airport outside Paris with fire trailing from its engine on the left wing. The plane crashed shortly after take-off, killing all 109 people aboard and four others on the ground. For nearly a decade, investigators have argued that the jet never would have crashed if a Continental Airlines DC-10 hadn't dropped a piece of titanium onto the runway minutes before the supersonic craft took off. That finding will go up for debate at a long-awaited trial on the crash, which began Feb. 2 after a decade of investigations.

Air France Concorde flight 4590 takes off from Charles de Gaulle airport outside Paris with fire trailing from its engine on the left wing. The plane crashed shortly after take-off, killing all 109 people aboard and four others on the ground. For nearly a decade, investigators have argued that the jet never would have crashed if a Continental Airlines DC-10 hadn’t dropped a piece of titanium onto the runway minutes before the supersonic craft took off. That finding will go up for debate at a long-awaited trial on the crash, which began Feb. 2 after a decade of investigations.  (Toshihiko Sato / Associated Press)

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Debris from the flight

Firemen look through debris at the Concorde crash site in Gonesse, north of Paris, the day after the accident.  (Laurent Rebours / Associated Press)

Attending the Concorde trial

The public occupies the audience room of the courthouse in Pontoise, northwest of Paris, before the start of the first day of the trial to determine who was to blame for the July 2000 Concorde disaster.  (Martin Bureau / AFP/Getty Images)

Panel of judges at the Concorde trial

Judges Lise Duquet, left, and Francoise Bazet, Presiding Judge Dominique Andreassier and Judge Claire Estevenet are seen at the start of the trial in Pontoise on the Air France Concorde crash.

,  (Francois Mori / Associated Press)

A defendant's lawyer

Olivier Metzner, a lawyer for Continental Airlines, arrives at the trial in Pontoise. A piece of metal shed during takeoff by an earlier Continental plane has been blamed for causing the sequence of events leading to the Air France Concorde crash.  (Francois Mori / Associated Press)

A U.S. airline official at the Concorde trial

Continental Airlines representative Ken Burt, left, listens to his lawyer at the trial on the Air France Concorde crash in Pontoise.  (Francois Mori / Associated Press)

Victims' kin at the Concorde trial

Family members of Polish victims who were interns at the hotel into which the Concorde crashed wait before the first day of the trial begins.  (Francois Mori / Associated Press)

Metal strip in crash of the Concorde

The metal strip that had fallen from a Continental DC-10 minutes before the crash of the Air France Concorde is displayed before the trial in Pontoise.

,  (Francois Mori / Associated Press)

Documents at the Concorde trial

Paperwork from Continental Airlines is displayed before the trial.  (Francois Mori / Associated Press)

Put in evidence at the Concorde trial

Evidence is displayed in the Pontoise courthouse. The trial will examine conflicting explanations of why the Air France Concorde smashed into a hotel in a ball of fire just after takeoff.  (Martin Bureau / AFP/Getty Images)

Commemoration of Concorde crash

Ali Altunisik, a former manager of the Relais Bleus hotel near where the Concorde plane crashed in 2000, stands by a commemorative plaque in Gonesse, outside Paris.  (Jacques Brinon / Associated Press)

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