Welcome to Flight Global Focus.

My name is Amber Elias and joining me for this News Focus episode is Craig Hoyle, Flight Global's European Defence Editor and Flight International Editor.

Hi Amber, to excuse the croaky voice today I think most of us have come back with colds from the air con and being around thousands of people.

And welcome Dominic Perry, European aerospace editor.

Who also has a similarly croaky The voice, possibly from being in the same place as Craig.

And Lewis Harper, airline Business editor, Are You well or not?

No, I think I'm at an earlier stage of that than my colleagues, but it's definitely coming on.

So yeah, just in time for the weekend, I'm sure.

Let's take a look at the top aviation stories this week on Flight Global.

A long running territorial dispute between Japan and South Korea has resulted in the Republic of Korea Air Force's Black Eagles display team to miss their first Dubai air show.

The team had been scheduled to refuel at Okinawa's Naha Air Base on the first leg of their journey to Dubai.

However, Tokyo withdrew permission for the Naha refuelling stop after a Black Eagles training session near Dogdo Island.

The Federal Aviation Administration plans to require airlines to replace mode control panels on Boeing 787 S due to a malfunction that could cause the jet systems to make uncommanded altitude changes.

On 14 November, the FAA released a proposed airworthiness directive to address the issue by requiring operators to complete a fix described in a service bulletin issued by Boeing in April.

Enhanced hot section components designed to double time on wing in harsh operating conditions for the Rolls Royce Front XWB 97 engine are beating expectations during ongoing dust ingestion testing.

For several years, Rolls Royce has been working to boost the longevity of components in the engine, particularly when operating in hot and sandy conditions such as those in the Middle East.

Although Etihad Airways and Qatar Airways, 2 of the Gulf's Big Three, are already customers of the A 350-1000 Emirates airline had declined to acquire the larger variant of Airbus's big twin until Rolls Royce improves the durability of the XWB 97.

Malaysia Airlines is set to launch a request for proposal for a new long haul wide body aircraft before the end of the year as part of their fleet renewal efforts.

The airline expects to make a decision on the aircraft type by the middle of the first quarter of 2026.

So as the CEO of the airline parent company Malaysia Aviation Group, Malaysia Airlines currently operates a fleet of seven A3 50's, the first of which was delivered in 2017.

The number of 77X in Boeing's backlog reduced by 33 jets in recent months after the company shifted those orders into an accounting bucket reserved for deals it suspects will not result in actual sales.

Boeing confirms the change to Flight Global after having disclosed revised backlog figures in its third quarter financial report.

The company made the shift in October but applied the change to its September figures.

Removing those 33 orders left 47377X and Boeing's backlog at the end of September, a figure unchanged through end October.

The adjustment came amid lengthy and ongoing delays to certify the first 77X variant, the 779.

Boeing on 29 October revealed another delay, saying it intends to deliver the first of its type in 2027, not 2026 as previously expected due to the Federal Aviation Administration's slow pace in improving certification flight testing.

So the 2025 Dubai Air Show has just wrapped up and U three were all at the show this week on the ground.

What was the big news coming out from an airline perspective?

Lewis.

It was busy for orders we thought it might be and it it, it definitely delivered in that regard.

Obviously largely orders from Middle Eastern carriers, a few African carriers as well.

Getting in on the ACT.

There was a a surprise one from Air Europa switching to to Airbus from it's currently a Boeing 787 operator, but ordered 408059 hundreds or certainly a provisional agreement.

So so yeah, it was it was really busy from that perspective, not a great surprise for a Dubai air show, I guess.

But when I look at the big theme, I would say coming out of this is, is definitely from the the two Dubai carriers, so Emirates and fly Dubai.

And I think the context that needs to be put in is the the opening of the the new airport at Almachtun where the air show itself took place, which is sort of meant to be happening in the early twenty 30s.

Obviously airport projects rarely meet their deadlines in that regard.

But but certainly the airlines are working towards that.

And I was obviously on the show site, there's one of the hottest tickets is to be in the round table with Sir Tim Clark, the the president of Emirates.

And I, I got that and it was really interesting to hear him talking about the vision for the future of Emirates fleet and very much including Fly Dubai in that vision.

We know they work pretty closely together.

We know Emirates is all wide body and obviously Fly Dubai while it is moving into wide bodies soon is is principally a a narrow body operator kind of when he talks about the vision for the fleet when they they move to this new airport, it is very much having the full range of aircraft, including those those narrow bodies that that Fly Dubai operate, albeit obviously in a sort of hybrid kind of low cost model.

So yeah, that that was really interesting.

I think the big orders, obviously Emirates going for 65 more 777 nines.

We know that Tim Clark has complained in the past about the delays for that.

He's obviously saying it's going to be one of the most tested aircraft in history by the time it eventually comes online.

I think at the moment Emirates is in line to get its first in early 2027, although Clark did look rather sceptical about that, I have to say during the the round table.

But he was very gushing about the 777 lines of product.

I think of it as long as it delivers what Boeing is saying it will.

So that that was kind of the, I guess the landmark order on the first day of the event.

A key point.

I'm sure Don will go on to talk about this a bit more.

They were also pressed for a feasibility study about a stretch of the 777X, so A77710 and Clark did talk about that.

All this needs to be put in the context of obviously Emirates is a big A380 operator at the moment.

Clark says he reckons they will continue operating from Emirates through to the late twenty 30s, early twenty 40s.

But at that point, if you look at the current slate of aircraft in production today, there isn't anything that comes anywhere near replacing the capacity of those jets.

And Clark talks about the big slot constraints at airports around the world at the big hubs and the obviously the big advantage Emirates gets from being able to put hundreds of people on on an aircraft.

So those slot constraints aren't such a big, big issue when it looks to it's network strategy.

So so yeah, that that was a really interesting development there.

Worth noting that Emirates did also place an order for the small follow on order for the A350900 later in the show.

That point though is that Emirates is is looking ahead to that that new airport and the the opportunities that that will bring.

Similarly fly Dubai, really interesting development there.

Obviously an all Boeing operator made a commitment for the A321 neo at the show, 150 of them.

My colleague went to a round table with Gaithal Gaith, the CEO of Fly Dubai.

And really the thinking there is they are looking ahead to the new airport and the opportunities that will bring.

They want an aircraft, the bigger aircraft at the moment, obviously the the 737 Max 10 is not certificated.

So they wanted some certainty about being able to get hold of those bigger aircrafts.

So, so that's why they've done that switch to to Airbus for that new order.

They're obviously hedging their bets a bit because they also made a, a commitment, a further commitment to the to the Max at the show as well.

But interesting there again, as I say that switch to Airbus, but all about what they're going to do when it comes to the new airport opening and really having just that that range of aircraft that means they can further leverage obviously Dubai's geographic advantages and and serve as many markets as possible around the world.

So, yeah, really interesting developments there from those two Dubai carriers.

And as I say, ETI had also placed a fairly significant wide body order obviously just down the road in Abu Dhabi.

There again, the interesting point there I guess is they are sort of tentatively growing again after I think it's fair to call it a failed strategy in the 20 tens around equity investments and really ramping up growth and that that not succeeding.

And I think the focus there is about frequencies as much as growing number of routes.

So knowing what works and and adding frequencies there.

So yeah, really busy show for orders that always makes it enjoyable covering it.

And as I say, there's there's a nice narrative around what's going on in Dubai and and where these orders go with the caveat, of course, we we see these big orders and they don't always come in.

When you look at the how the fleet ends up looking in a few years time, yeah, that's the the biggest indicator of what's actually going on.

But certainly a huge amount of ambition on show.

And from an aerospace perspective, the airframers are a big part of the orders.

Was there an equally optimistic side from them in being able to deliver any of these orders?

Well, there's the question.

It sort.

Of depends certainly on the narrow body side on whether the engine makers can get themselves back on track.

And I think that's this very much a short term problem which should be resolved by the end of the year perhaps.

And then we'll see as both Boeing and Airbus ramp up further through 2026 and 2027.

Obviously Airbus has declared it wants to build 75 aircraft per month from 2027, but we'll see if that transpires.

I think what struck me apart from the size of the orders, which you know, it's nice to see these huge deals coming in again, although it does tend to obscure some of the smaller ones.

You know, Once Upon a time we would have said 6 new A-350's for Ethiopian was a was a significant order.

But you know it's rather put in the in the shade by 150 of whatever and 65 of this and that and the other.

But amongst those 65777X's for Emirates of course was the possibility that they can convert them in the future to either the Dash 8 or to this Dash 10, which would be a further stretch of the 777X.

The question, of course, becomes whether Boeing really wants to build that stretch.

Are 65 orders or possibly fewer enough on their own to justify that development?

And if it does become the de facto replacement for the A380, is that still big enough?

Certainly, a colleague who was at the press conference with Boeing said that Boeing's Stephanie Pope looked rather surprised when the mention of the study was brought up.

So we'll see.

And, and as well, Boeing is quite cautious at the moment because it has so many of these certification projects going through and it has to deliver those before it can really start on the next steps.

And of course, if it does pull the trigger, if you like, on the triple 710, then the question becomes what Airbus does.

It has talked previously about doing the A3502000 to a further stretch of the A 350-1000, but there's again, there's no guarantee that it wants to do that aircraft.

You could certainly argue that it would rather not.

And again, it has its own slew of certification on development projects ongoing and by that point will also probably have started have moved closer to launching its new narrow body.

There's also the question of engines.

At the moment the Rolls Royce Trent XWB 97 is the only engine for the A 350-1000.

So Rolls Royce would have to take that power plant and increase the thrust from it if it wanted to serve the Dash 2000.

But in the meantime, of course, it is dealing with its own durability issues on that engine, particularly, you'll note, in the Middle East where it's hot and sandy.

So it has a package of durability improvements going into the XWB 97, which will be fully realised from 2028.

And it could be at that point, or at least when we get closer to that, that Emirates finally comes round and orders the A3501000, which it notably shield away from at this show, presumably because it doesn't feel the engine is quite ready yet.

Or perhaps Rolls Royce hasn't proved yet that it can withstand the Middle East's notoriously difficult operating environment.

And one of the most, I guess, exciting different new things that was on display at Dubai was Joby's electric vertical take off and landing.

EV Toll took part in the flying display.

Dom, you were there.

What was that like?

It was quiet that I I think that's the most noticeable thing about it.

We, we obviously.

See lots of things at air shows that can hover like called helicopters, but they are quite noisy comparatively.

But whilst the JB aircraft was up and flying, you could walk along the flight line and all you heard was the noise from ground power units and engines running on the ground.

You couldn't hear the JB aircraft.

But with every other helicopter that was flying, they make a racket.

There's no getting around that.

So that was really interesting.

Of course, it's not certificated yet and the market hasn't necessarily been proved for those aircraft, but clearly manufacturers are pushing very much into the Middle East.

They see it as and forgive the the slight pan, they see it as a sandbox to test these aircraft before they are deployed elsewhere in the world.

Archer, JB and others are all focused on the region.

Again, Archer signed an agreement with a Saudi operator to trial its aircraft there and advance air mobility in the Kingdom and so on and so forth.

So we'll see how all this plays out.

Craig, you were on site at Dubai with a few of our other defence colleagues.

What was the main news coming out of the defence sector?

Yeah.

So there were two of us there on team defence, myself and Greg Waldron.

And yeah, I think noticeably after talking about joby team defence, you can always count on to bring the noise and air show and there's a lot of fighter activity.

So, so certainly delivered on that front.

And it's worth noting, I think with Dubai, you never know quite what you're going to get on the defence side.

So at the end of 2021, we went to Dubai Air Show thinking there were going to be big fighter things happening in about a month later, they ordered a load of Rafael's.

Two years back, a few months before the show, they ordered some new jet trainers.

So you never know quite whether the UAE will make some big announcement there.

So what was in its favour this time?

We had a bit of uncertainty ahead of the show and then we found out the week before that the Russians were coming.

So Rostek brought in a large a large load of equipment.

The most notable arrival definitely was Suku's SU-57 fifth generation fighter, which also appeared in flying display.

For most people that's the first time to see it because obviously Russia can't show its technology at places like Farnborough and Paris with the embargo after the invasion of Ukraine.

When was the last time that Russia was at an air show?

Well.

So they do still appear because the sort of Middle East countries it, it's more sort of neutral, non aligned.

They still appear at Dubai air shows.

So they were there last time they were there 21, So they still appear.

But in in the West they can't come to any of the events.

So yeah, I know the SU-57 earlier this year was at the Aero India show in Bengaluru.

So it's starting to get out into the show circuit.

But let's say we won't see it in Europe regarding its actual flying display yet.

Very impressive.

You saw lots of the really agile kind of manoeuvres you expect of this sort of fighter, so Cobra, falling leaf, all that, all that sort of thing.

It did a pass where it opened one of its internal weapons bays, which I don't think we had seen before.

So that was pretty notable.

But yeah, an impressive fighter.

They're trying to get new export customers.

They've got a deal with Algeria to do 14, but that's their only bias so far apart from Russia.

We also had the Cam of KA52 attack helicopter in the flying display and they brought the Yak 130 M advanced jet trainer for static.

We weren't quite sure how it was going to go with the Russians.

After a bit of back and forth, we did manage to grab a few words with the Rostech CEO.

So Greg, Greg Waldron got a chance to get in there and pitch a question, not the one that was handed to him on a piece of paper.

We should note he did venture for the little bit about the SU-75 Checkmate, which is the net Russian fighter and said work continues with production to launch soon.

So watch that space.

I think that programme really hinges on getting an export buyer, so we'll see.

Also of note in the defence side, we have EU as Alpha San aerobatic display team.

We didn't know they were going to do this.

They put on their show with their new jet trainers.

So they had flown Italian built MB 339's and they've now got a a shiny new fleet of Hongdu L Fifteens which about in China they put on a very good display.

And notably back to the sort of loudness thing, the L15 makes a really spectacular sort of howling noise as it comes through.

So not quite sure what causes that, but everybody was commenting on that.

And then just sort of more broadly at the show, there was a lot of chat about Saudi Arabia.

So President Trump announced just before the show he plans to approve a sale of F30 fives.

There's a lot of questions around if Riyadh's going to ditch its previous fighter contest, which was F15, Rafael and Typhoon.

So I think we'll know in a few days.

There might be more coming from the White House otherwise in the UA specifically Airbus Defence and Space was talking up the prospects of an A400M sale.

UA has got a very old fleet of Hercules that needs to replace and Embraer was also promoting the the KC 390 tanker transport and brought it's new demonstrator which looked very, very impressive.

So yeah, it was, it was good on the defence side and and as ever a lot of announcements from companies coming in signing Mous and agreements with Emirati industry, particularly players like Edge.

It's notable every time you come to do by the, the Edge stand at the start of the exhibit hall gets bigger and bigger and they are just expanding at a very impressive pace.

So yeah, lots to see.

It was hot.

There were long days, but yeah, we we wouldn't miss it.

Yeah, it's always worth going because as you say, you do, you never really know what's going to come out of these shows.

And sometimes it's very quiet and nothing's as expected.

And other times feels like everybody's been saving their news for the show itself.

Yeah.

I mean, there's certainly wasn't any any of us got the impression it was quiet in terms of sort of announcements, things to see.

But just The Walking through the halls and down out at the flight line it, it was absolutely heaving the days we were there.

So that was great to see.

And Lois, do you think the Dubai Air Show becoming bigger and bigger each year is a reflection of how strong the airline market is in the Middle East and how much it's growing and competing on a global scale now, I think?

Undeniably, yeah, I mentioned the ambition there and Emirates has got a very proven business model in Dubai.

It's the most profitable airline in the world by quite some distance.

We've got obviously alongside the orders placed at the show, we know that in Saudi Arabia there's there's huge ambition around building up the airline sector there alongside a big push on on tourism.

Obviously Riyadh Air did have a presence in Dubai.

There's an engine commitment but no aircraft order.

But it is yeah, exactly the case that when you look at the fastest growing airline markets globally, the Middle East is up there.

Obviously the Paris Air Show and farm where held in Europe, but that that isn't the growth engine of the the global airline market.

There's there's certainly a lot more going on in the Middle East in that regard.

So yeah, the the real proof though, as I mentioned before about all these orders is is what actually happens.

But, you know, Tim Clark is pretty optimistic about what what's ahead for Emirates.

Yeah, we'll see what happens in Saudi Arabia.

But it is, you know, so far so good, I guess in terms of for most carriers, you know, making the most of that opportunity in the Middle East.

And we'll see what the next decade or so brings as these or some of these new aircraft come into service.

Yeah, absolutely.

And you do hope that the airframers can supply what's needed and what's been ordered to the airlines to fulfil their growth opportunities.

Well, yes, exactly that.

As Dom mentioned, there's the engine issues as well, you know, supply chain challenges, talk to any airline CEO.

It's the issue that that doesn't go away at the moment.

So yes, that's the other unanswered question as well.

I think there, it's generally some optimism that there might be 2-3 years left to run on, on some of the challenges in that regard and that things should get a bit better then.

But, but we all know that the airline industry and the wide aerospace sector is, is very vulnerable to, to outside developments.

Obviously COVID has a huge impact in, in that regard in on the supply chain.

So.

So yeah, no one's counting their chickens, I think.

But there are unanswered questions there.

Certainly I.

Certainly got the impression from from talking to the great and the good various airframers that they felt the problems were getting better.

Now, no one expects it to be an issue that solved overnight, particularly the supply chain, but it's making progress in the right direction.

Maybe another 18 months, 24 months, who knows.

These these things have a habit of lingering on longer than anyone wants.

And as ever, it's not, it's not always the problem that you expect.

And if an aircraft is missing a single bolt, you know, that holds up the whole thing.

But it was always also noticeable.

Talking to Boeing, they feel they think a little bit more confident that they are getting back to a much better place in terms of their safety culture and their production quality.

You've seen that with a recent ramp up or permission to ramp up production on the 737 Max, which was granted by the USFAA.

But they just have to keep banging away at that.

And they have 3 programmes that they need to get over the line in terms of the 7779 and the 737-7 and Dash 10.

But there seem to be confidence, I would say confidence that they are making the right moves and things are genuinely getting better and things are getting better at their major supplier Spirit Air Systems as well, which was a a major source of problems over the last 1218 months.

Yeah.

And just to add to that as well, I was with Embraer for a briefing and yeah, exactly that bit more optimism certainly on some of the groundings related to the Pratt's GTF engines on their E twos saying there'll be no aircraft on the ground by the end of 26, I think was there impression and I think Pratt said the same to you, but also saying that the new engines coming online with new deliveries are performing very well and giving them more optimism about about that situation.

So yeah, there are definitely pockets of optimism about about that issue, but definitely some lingering concerns as well.

Craig, Dom and Lewis, thank you so much for joining me for this week's episode of Flight Global Focus.

It's been a pleasure chatting to you about the Dubai Air Show.

Thank.

You.

You're welcome.

Thanks, Amber.

Cheers for now.

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