The five are said to be two employees of Continental Airlines, two from Concorde maker Aerospatiale, and the French civilian aviation authority.

The trial will take place in two to three months' time, the officials say.

The plane caught fire after its tyres were punctured by a piece of metal on the runway from a Continental plane.

Rubber from the tyres ruptured the plane's fuel tanks shortly after take-off from Paris's Charles de Gaulle airport.

A French accident inquiry in 2004 found that the strip of metal had fallen on the runway from a Continental plane that took off just before the Concorde flight.

All 109 people on board the Concorde flight and four people on the ground were killed.

BBC