Airbus and Boeing have travelled to the Farnborough air show with backlogs still around historic highs, regardless of the impressive fall in new net orders that has followed the credit crunch.
According to Flightglobal’s analysis the leading ACAS fleet database shows that as the significant ramp-up in orders are known to have collapsed within the last 24 months, by the end of June both manufacturers still held a combined backlog of 6,555 aircraft (4,165 narrowbodies and 2,390 widebodies).
It is down a relatively modest 10% from the height of two years ago, when numbers hit 7,299, nonetheless it is still in excess of twice the volume on the height of the last boom period a decade ago.
Airbus, boosted by the Emirates order for 32 A380s, goes to the show with its widebody backlog at an historic high.
The United Airlines order for 25 Boeing 787s and 25 Airbus A350s served to push the net order intake for widebodies to 122 in the first half of 2010.
A year ago, in the wake of the Paris air show, the first half net orders for widebodies were standing at a negative 34 after having a wave of cancellations.
Narrowbody net orders placed have still to demonstrate any signs of recovering immediately after their dramatic slide of the past three years, standing at just 91 new net orders for the first half of 2010, below the 150 posted at the half-way stage last year.