Airshow Report – GA Cockpits at Paris Air Show 2009

By Boran Pivčić
All photos author

In another first for my blog, I bring you the “Paris Air Show GA” series – almost live :). Since I hauled my laptop along, I might as well use it and post some photo action from the show. Blessed with press access – and a number of very friendly representatives of several major bizjet manufacturers – I had the opportunity to sneak around the insides of some of the most modern bizjets in the sky. All of the photos in this specific post were taken on Thursday, June 18, the fourth and last trade day (the next three days is the open public part). So here goes…

First up is the Italian beauty, the Piaggio P-180 Avanti II. Unfortunately it was not plugged into a GPU when I visited...

A lot of glass and class :). The impressive Bombardier GlobalExpress XRS was the largest bizjet at the show (alongside the Falcon 7X)

What show would be complete without Learjet's pocket rockets? The 60XR - cockpit pictured - is, according to its pilot, the fastest climbing civil aircraft without afterburner. On a good day, he said they can reach 41,000 ft in 12 minutes! On one flight - with little fuel and no pax - they even managed to reach 13,500 fpm for a brief moment!

And I'm proud to bring you an exclusive - the cockpit of the Learjet 85 mockup :). The all-carbon fibre aircraft is still in development and is promising to be a world beater. Judging from inside the cockpit, it certainly will be impressive. Many thanks to Bombardier's Mr. John who showed me around! — And I'm proud to bring you an exclusive - the cockpit of the Learjet 85 mockup :). The all-carbon fibre aircraft is nearing completion and is promising to be a world beater. Judging from inside the cockpit, it certainly will be impressive. Many thanks to Bombardier's Mr. John who showed me around!

Unfortunately, neither Gulfstream nor Cessna were in attendance, both dropping out due to the recession and the fact that they had appeared at the EBACE business aviation event in Geneva, Switzerland a couple of weeks back… which was a major letdown as I was looking forward to seeing the Citation X and any big Gulfstream…

Dassault’s Falcon division was also present at the show, but access to their aircraft was “Invitation only” – a marked difference to the “come in and look around” attitude of Piaggio and Bombardier (and Pilatus)…

JUNE 19th UPDATE: not to needlessly open another post, I’ll just continue in this one. Have two more GA cockpits to add today, some more glass :):