PARIS AIR SHOW
Written: 26 JUNE 2007

After wanting to go for years, this year my wish finally came through leaving Kristian and I with the chance to go to Le Bourget to experience the 47th International Paris Air Show.

Paris Air Show is one of the worlds biggest aviation exhibitions, and this year it was the biggest ever in Paris history with a total of almost 2000 exhibitors and an expected visitor number of half a million. The show was divieded in two; "Trade Visitor Days" the first part of the week and "General Public Days" in the weekend.

We went to Paris on Thursday via Aberdeen and Amsterdam and stayed at a fairly central hotel in the center of Paris. We spent all of Friday and Sunday strolling around the Air Show, and Saturday was spent sightseeing in Paris.

The show is usually known for plenty of new plane orders from airlines around the world, and this year they ordered 425 Airbuses ($60 billion) and 81 Boeings (which was rather poorly represented at the show).

In addition to the static display, there were 4 hours of flying display every day with A380, Constellation, Eurofighter, F16, F/A18, MIG29, Rafale, Mirage amongst others.

There were 6 huge halls with a massive number of exhibitors displaying everything from ejection seats to the smallest nuts and bolts. Not everything in there was of huge interest to a couple of pilots. The show also had a big museum with a variety of flying objects from balloons to spacecrafts (Two of the Concordes are displayed here).

All in all a fantastic experience which is a must for a aviation enthusiast. I wish of course that the show gave us an opportunity to explore more of the inside of all of these planes, but common sense dictates that you can't have half a million people running through a brand new A380 in a week.

 

On of the main attractions was of couse the Airbus A380 (the worlds biggest passenger airplane), hence the slight excess of pictures here.

Up till now Airbus has sold 163 of the type (including one VIP airplane to an unknown private individual). They expect to sell a total of 750 airplanes, and will break even after selling about 420.

The A380 has been the source for alot of turbulence in the Airbus administration, after alot of delays and development problems. It looks however like the first route will be flown in October when Singapore Airlines puts its first A380 into service on its London-Singapore-Sydney route.

It was incredible to watch the huge monster take off and maneuver so elegantly across the sky. Though that will certainly change once they fill it up with passengers and fuel.

John Travolta (who had his B707 parked on the other side of the runway) is apparently the first non-test pilot who has got the chance to test fly the A380. Should have been me...

 

In the exhibition halls there were a massive number of exhibitors from all parts of the industry. Everything from the smallest bolt and hydraulic hose to the biggest engines on the market. Several Asian aircraft manufacturers were represented here and had several exciting planes on the drawing board. The Russians were also noticable present both in military and civilian aviation.

In total there were almost 2000 exhibitors at the show, with most of them displayed in the 6 halls.

 

 

One of the most magnificent airplanes through all time was also present here. The Lockheed L-1049 Super Constellation symbolizes to many the golden age of aviation. This is one of the few which is still airworthy and is being maintained by an organisation with financial support from the watch manufacturer Breitling.

The airplane was developed after encouragement from Howard Hughes of TWA in 1939 (known to most people from the movie "The Aviator" with DiCaprio). As the first widespread pressurized aircraft, it introduced affordable and comfortable air travel for the masses. Pan Am started the worlds first scheduled around-the-world route in 47. The later models was capable of flying at 25 000 ft at 310 kts with a range of 4700 nm.

The Constellation was quickly replaced when the jet age came in the early 50s. The airplane had its last passenger flight in 67 (though it was used for freight a while longer).

The business jets manufacturers were well represented, which was expected considering the growth in this line of travel the last couple of years. Dassault had its Falcon range on display, Gulfstream had its G200, G450 and G550, while Cessna had 4 of its Citations on display.

The military presence was also fairly large. USAF had C17, C130, F15, F16, F/A18 on display. France has their Dassault fighters on static display and in the air. All the alternatives for the new Norwegian fighter were present. Eurofighter Typhoon, Joint Strike Fighter and JAS Gripen. Of these only the Eurofighter flew.