Farnborough International Airshow 2024
The aerospace industry descended on the UK in July for the Farnborough International Airshow, the biennial industry showcase. Over five days 100,000 visitors, 1500 exhibitors from over 60 countries, 90 civil and military aircraft, over 390 civil, military and space delegations made the trip to the Hampshire airfield, the birthplace of aviation in the UK. This was however a different, leaner version of the UK’s most famous airshow which took place during a period of some turbulence for aviation and global politics.
Paul Johnson/Flightline UK reports from the Tuesday and Wednesday. All photography by the author.
The month of July has become the month of the aerospace in the UK. The annual Royal International Air Tattoo itself has become a showcase for industry, particularly with the Chief of the Air Staff’s Global Air and Space Chiefs’ Conference taking place the same week. However, every two years RIAT is immediately followed by Farnborough International Airshow, the UK’s most famous airshow and its biggest showcase of the global aviation and space industry.
Farnborough have in recent years spent a huge amount of money and effort in developing their main exhibition hall. What is ‘Hall 1’ for the airshow is now a permanent exhibition space which hosts many other events throughout the year. Halls 2,3 and 4 plus the Space Exhibition remain temporary structures which are erected and fitted out in the months before the event every two years. All that exhibition space was sold out for 2024 with all manner of companies displaying their wares either individually or part of the ‘national pavilions’ within the halls. On the closing day of the Airshow, Farnborough International reported that more than 100 companies have already rebooked for the 2026 Airshow “including the likes of Bell, Viasat, Reaction Engines, MBDA, and Northrop Grumman.”
Farnborough’s role in promoting UK industry is not lost on the UK Government which this year took a more prominent role at the event with a Hub which provided political, industry and international stakeholders with a unique platform to elevate the incoming government’s backing for UK aerospace, defence and space sectors. Ten different government departments and agencies had a presence at the Hub which proved a highly attended feature of the show.
One thing you notice about the halls however is that the really big household names from aerospace industry do not use them. Instead, they have their own exhibition areas dotted around the peripheries of the main halls and chalets all of which are guarded by dedicated security staff – sometimes you have to wonder if Farnborough causes major shortages of trained security staff across Southern England given the shear amount of private staff required to guard Airbus, Boeing, BAE Systems, Lockheed Martin, Rolls Royce and all the private chalets!
Outside of the halls there was a varied static display of aircraft. Except it was not the usual static display we come accustomed to with almost no executive jets present within the showground. Just Qatar Airways contributed a new Gulfstream G700 from their Qatar Executive operation. The emerging market of eVTOL transport, which may someday aid urban mobility and short distance corporate transport, was well presented with a growing number of concepts and trials aircraft in attendance such as the Wisk V6, the Joby Electric Air Taxi, the Lilium Jet and the Supernal SA-2.
Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) have become increasingly significant at Farnborough with a number of different platforms on show in the static and flying displays. Catching the eye this year were the Greenjets Sentinal and the Skyfarer Orca which both featuring in the flying displays. The Skyfarer Orca is currently very active in the UK and has been used to provide a rapid aerial transport service for medical and pharmaceutical customers
A notable absence this year from the static and flying displays were commercial aircraft from Boeing. Their products were not entirely absent however with Qatar Airways exhibiting one of their Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners kitted out with their latest interiors.
Airbus were back in numbers celebrating some of most recent deliveries. At the centre of their static display was one of Virgin Atlantic’s latest A330-900NEOs, ‘Ruby Rebel.’ During Farnborough, Virgin announced orders for nine further A330-900NEOs completing the renewal of their long-haul fleet. Airbus also highlighted its short haul offerings with a JetBlue A220-200 and British Airways exhibiting the Airbus A320NEO. The latest Airbus long-haul design in service with the world’s airlines, the Airbus A350-900, was showcased by Air India during the first half of the week.
Airbus’ ground exhibition also included some of its military products with an Airbus A400M Atlas C1 from the Royal Air Force plus an Airbus C295MW destined for the Mozambique military. They also had full scale models of the H160 Helicopter plus some remotely piloted aerial systems including their ‘Wingman.’ Curiously, the H175 helicopter being offered to the UK military for the delayed new medium helicopter requirement was absent.
Embraer had another impressive collection of aircraft on display. Alongside the KC-390 Millennium, Super Tucano and familiar E190 Profit Hunter, they brought the E190F Freighter to Farnborough for the first time. By comparison, Leonardo’s display seemed rather low key compared to previous years. In terms of manned aircraft, they only had the Leonardo M436-FA combat trainer jet and AW149 helicopter on display alongside some of their unmanned products. On its own in a more distant part of the static display Leonardo and the Royal Navy exhibited the AW159 Wildcat HMA2 fitted with its armaments wings and displaying a variety of different stores.
Adjacent to Leonardo were UK based HeliOperations based at Portland. The company provides training for search and rescue operations and more recently the provision of former Royal Navy Sea Kings for Ukrainian military service. One of those Sea King HU5s were on display alongside their new Leonardo AW139.
Inside a triple ring of barriers and watchful troops was the United States Department of Defense ‘corral’ of equipment. Quite why the US DoD thinks all of their equipment is at such a risk at Farnborough is difficult to answer, particularly when at RIAT most US aircraft can be separated from the crowd by rope and blue cones or single barriers in case of the more sensitive Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightning II. It is even more curious when you go to Dubai and see the aircraft with no barriers with just their ground crews around them! Alongside the F-35A were a pair of F-16CJ Fighting Falcons from Aviano AB, a Kentucky Air National Guard C-130J Hercules II and a General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper. The US Army presented a Boeing AH-64E Apache Guardian, Sikorsky UH-60V Blackhawk and a CH-47F Chinook while a US Navy Boeing P-8A Poseidon overlooked the whole area.
Lockheed Martin are pushing the Sikorsky UH-60M Blackhawk for the UK’s new medium helicopter and this was highlighted outside their exhibition area with a Slovak Air Force example making its UK airshow debut. Further military participation in the static area came from the Italian Air Force with a pair of Eurofighter F-2000A Typhoons. These aircraft departed during Friday’s Pioneers of Tomorrow Flying display performing a single flypast before heading south.
The daily flying displays at Farnborough changed day by day with only a few core displays that appeared everyday. Monday benefited from a number of aircraft returning to their bases after RIAT with flypasts from the Red Arrows, RAF Typhoon FGR4, RAF F-35B Lightning, USAF F-15E Strike Eagle and USAF F-35A Lightning II. Friday saw Farnborough invite a public audience for ‘Pioneers of Tomorrow’ Day which is held to encourage a new generation into aerospace. It also features an enhanced flying display with several airshow favourites such Rich Goodwin’s Jet Pitts, the NavyWings Heritage Flight, Stampe Formation Team and the Aerosuperbatic Wingwalkers.
Friday also featured the British Army’s Red Devils Parachute Display Team who also opened Tuesday’s flying displays. With Aldershot Garrison just a short distance away, Farnborough is something of a home show for the team who gave spectacular displays with some exciting canopy relative work and jumping with some very large flags.
No Farnborough display would be complete without at least one contribution from Airbus. With their long-haul fleet now well established, the European manufacturer this year focussed on the new requirement for smaller long-range airliners demonstrating its Airbus A321-253XLR. With the likes of JetBlue airlines now serving UK airports with transatlantic flights on the Airbus A321, this is an exciting new market for Airbus which used their development aircraft’s livery to highlight that the A321XLR could connect New York to Rome or London to New Delhi.
The Airbus-Leonardo joint venture ATR has exhibited it wares in the Farnborough static display for many years and did so again this year with ATR-72-600 destined for a Swedish customer. However, this year they also demonstrated their development ATR-72-600 in the air. Like the Airbus A321XLR, the ATR used a blend of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) for its display which showed off the type’s agility and short field performance.
Turkish Aerospace Industries made an eye-catching contribution to the flying display with the TAI T625 Gökbey helicopter. The Gökbey has been designed a medium sized utlity and transport for helicopter for military and civilian applications. It features Turkish developed avionics and will eventually be equipped it indigenously produced powerplants as well. Having first flown in 2018, the Gökbey is still working its way through certification and the example in the flying display was a development aircraft featuring various flight test equipment and sensors.
Compared to the last two Farnborough Airshows, the flying displays has a more defence related focus. Embraer gave a flying demonstration of their KC-390 Millennium on the Tuesday. Already in service with the Brazilian and Portuguese Air Forces, the type is soon to be a more widely seen type in Europe with Czechia, the Netherlands and Austria purchasing the type.
As well as the flypasts on the Monday, the Royal Air Force made further contributions to the flying display throughout the week. Wednesday flying display saw a single flypast from one of the service’s Boeing P-8A Poseidon MRA1s from RAF Lossiemouth. Another Boeing product featured in the flying on all five days with the Chinook Role Demonstration flying their final displays of the season a short hop from their RAF Odiham base. Unlike at Cosford or RIAT, they flew the classic Chinook HC6A variant at Farnborough with its smaller fuel sponsons. However their display was just the same with the aircraft delivering an artillery piece as an underslung load before deploying members of the RAF Benson based Joint Helicopters Support Squadron on foot and by all terrain quad bike.
The United States Air Force made a welcome return to the Farnborough flying programme with a flypast by the Boeing B-52H Stratofortress on the Wednesday and Friday. Temporarily deployed to RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire, the aircraft came from the 20th Bomb Squadron of the 2nd Bomb Wing based at Barksdale AFB in Louisiana.
It was however the return of full fast jet displays to Farnborough that really grabbed the attention. 2024 marks the 50th Anniversary of the General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon andthat was celebrated at Farnborough by Lockheed Martin and the Royal Danish Air Force with a solo display by Captain Troels ‘Teo’ Vang in F-16AM Fighting Falcon E-190. Much is made of Farnborough’s complicated display area, but ‘Teo’ was able to adapt his normal display to fit around the unusual bowl-shaped display box which prevents aerobatics over the built-up areas. E-190 was an appropriate aircraft to mark the 50th Anniversary as its is one of the oldest F-16s still in military service. The F-16 has long been part of the Farnborough Airshow with some memorable displays by General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin test pilots. It is also likely to make further appearances at future Farnborough with the latest F-16V just entering service with the Slovak and Bahraini Air Forces.
But perhaps the most outstanding contribution came from Boeing with the Advanced Eagle Demo. The 1970’s designed McDonnell Douglas F-15 has been developed by Boeing using modern avionics and new composite construction giving it a new lease of life as a highly advanced multi-role combat aircraft for the 21st century. It is already in service with the Royal Saudi Air Force as the F-15SA and the United States Air Force as the F-15EX. However for their displays at RIAT and Farnborough, Boeing used the very attractively marked F-15QA Ababil destined for the Qatari Emiri Air Force with two aircraft in the flying display and a further example on static display in a multi-role configuration wearing special anniversary markings. The Boeing crews of Jason Dotter, Matt Giese, Kevin Tinsley and Michael Quintini presented two different displays at Farnborough; one F-15QA in a clean configuration and another fitted with 12 AIM-120 AMRAAM missiles. Both displays demonstrated that the F-15QA has incredible manoeuvrability whatever its loadout and offers its crew care-free handling able to achieve some very high angles of attack and even perform a tailslide.
Farnborough International Airshow 2024 was, from an aircraft point of view, somewhat smaller than previous editions. It did give the showground element a rather drawn out feel with the likes of BAE Systems feeling rather detached from the rest of the show. However, it was far worse for the Aerobility Charity, Historic Army Aircraft Flight and the RAF Motorsport Association who were closer to Laffan’s Plain than the bustle of the show!
That aside, Farnborough International reported a very successful week from a business point of view with $105.8bn in commercial aircraft and engine orders announced from the likes of Airbus, Boeing, Embraer and many more, worth £13bn to the UK economy.
Gareth Rogers, CEO of Farnborough International, said: “This week, Farnborough International Airshow has delivered for the aerospace, space and defence industries, across the show floor also achieving huge global media reach showcasing the apex of aviation. Farnborough International’s role has evolved substantially, progressing to an internationally esteemed change agent with significant influence that powers excellence and innovation. Labelled as the ‘most important event in the aerospace calendar’ by our exhibitors, the airshow is a physical manifestation of that unrelenting progress.”
“It has been a joy to host the global industry to the UK once again and we look forward to welcoming them back to the 2026 airshow and to our growing events portfolio across the year.”
