A WORD FROM EDITOR
AMAJOR EVENT ON THE global civil aviation scene in the recent past was the Dubai Airshow 2107 held in the second week of November 2017. A report on this event from Dubai by Bikram Vohra says that the event marked a 175 per cent surge in the value of deals concluded compared to the show in 2015, which saw only $39.8 billion in agreements. The Airshow was dominated by Boeing as Emirates placed orders for 40 Boeing 787-10 Dreamliners valued at $15.1 billion. Boeing secured a total commitment for 302 aircraft including 50 options with a value of about $50.7 billion. However, while Boeing had the lead, Airbus that was lagging behind initially, caught up with an order for 430 single-aisle Airbus A320neo airliners valued at nearly $50 billion. Analysing commercial aviation in the Middle East, Bikram Vohra is of the view that there are challenges for the Middle East airline industry. The carriers of the Middle East nations have made colossal investments in wide-body airliners, but rather unfortunately, profits have dropped by around ten per cent. Some of the carriers are finding it difficult to break even. Solution to their problems may lie in inducting airliners of smaller size such as the latest E2 regional jets from Embraer.
Year 2017 was a good year for the global civil aviation sector with continued growth across the board. Included in this issue is a photo feature show casing the highlights of 2017. Having delivered its 1,400th airliner, an E175 regional jet, to Envoy Air, part of the American Airlines Group, the Brazilian aerospace major is riding high in the global market. Talking about the aims and objectives of the company, Mariana Luz, the Global Head of Sustainability and CSR at Embraer, says “Building a sustainable future is one of Embraer’s core values. As a company that has, over its 48 year history, delivered more than 8,000 aircraft, Embraer takes into account the full impact of the development of new product based on each stage of the product’s life cycle”.
In an effort to decongest the six major hub airports in the country, the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) is advocating direct air connectivity between cities so as to bypass the hub airports and help reduce traffic density through hub airports. These routes connecting cities located far apart have been described by the MoCA as “Thin Long Routes” on which the volume of passenger traffic may not be high enough to generate remunerative passenger load factors. The airlines would need to operate aircraft with long range, but seating capacity lower than that of the Airbus A320 and the Boeing 737 family of airliners. A report on operating on “Thin Long Routes” is a part of this issue.
In the regime of regional aviation, China Express, the first private regional airline in China became the newest operator of CFM International’s CFM56 engines when it took delivery of the first of 11 CFM56-5B-powered Airbus A320ceo aircraft. With this induction, and the remaining Airbus A320 to be delivered in 2018 and 2019, the airline has embarked on an expansion drive. A report by R. Chandrakanth figures in this issue of SP’s AirBuz.
All this and more in this issue of SP’s AirBuz. We wish our readers a “Happy New Year” and look forward to a prosperous 2018.
Welcome aboard and wish you happy landings!