In 1962 Britain and France agreed on a collaborative venture to develop a passenger aircraft that would fly at twice the speed of sound. Concorde first flew at Toulouse in March 1969. Scheduled services began in January 1976. During 27 years of service, Concorde carried 2.5 million passengers on just fewer than 50,000 flights. The fastest transatlantic crossing was in 1996 when Concorde flew from New York to London in 2 hours, 52 minutes and 59 seconds. The last scheduled passenger flight landed at London Heathrow, from New York JFK, at 4:05pm on Friday 24th October 2003. To mark the occasion, two other Concorde aircraft landed just ahead of the incoming New York flight.