An industry devastated by Covid takes flight again at the Paris Air Show

I

admit, I’m an avowed aviation enthusiast, so attending the international Paris Air Show last month was actually a labor of love.

It’s been four years since the aviation and space industry’s biggest air show was held in person, so the thousands of tourist ticket holders and professionals there to close major aviation deals were especially enthusiastic.

The Covid pandemic devastated air travel, with the aviation industry laying off masses of experienced workers. Thousands of planes were grounded, there was no demand for new ones, satellite companies went bankrupt, affiliated industries took a major hit, and the industry as a whole sank to an all-time nadir.

Now, though, with a surge in air travel demand and airlines desperate for planes to keep up with it, the Paris Air Show — a trade event where companies get a chance to showcase new technology, commercial and military aircraft, and strike deals — was back, a test of the recovering aviation industry. And it turns out that its recovery is stronger than ever.

Airlines are desperate for new planes and crews to staff them in order to meet the exploding demand. People who swore they’d never fly again have found themselves trying to find a flight to some destination and willing to pay the price, while manufacturers Boeing and Airbus are scrambling to fill orders on a long wait list.

Whatever Flies 

The Paris Air Show has been taking place for 114 years, beginning just six years after Wilbur and Orville Wright created the first successful flying machine that took to the skies at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina in 1903.

There was probably not too much to see at the time, but from 1953, several years after the jet engine became a standard aircraft feature, the show has been taking place regularly, every two years, in this huge exhibition ground near the La Bourget Airport.

The world’s premier air show is primarily intended for aviation dealers, so the first week is only open to industry professionals and trade visitors before being open to the public. This year, hundreds of thousands of visitors vied for the tourist tickets, which were sold out just a few hours after going on sale.

For those regular visitors who’ve been missing the show these last years, not much has changed. Weapons and aircraft dealers still converge here by the thousands, huddling outside the magnificent booths, finalizing the details of huge contracts while trying to overcome the deafening noise generated by the latest models of aircraft hovering above, displaying the latest in aviation.

And yet, there is one glaring difference. One of the fixtures here had been a Russian Tupolev flying overhead, performing hair-raising stunts. Now, however, there’s not a trace of a single Russian craft. It’s doubtful if, after Russia’s failure on the battlefront, western buyers will ever consider coming back around to Russian manufactured goods.   Actually, difficult memories go back 50 years, when a daring exercise by a Tupolev TU-144 Russian plane ended in a horrific crash. The six crew members were killed, along with eight people on the ground who were watching the show.