Dubai Airshow 2017 Reaching For New Horizons

 Dubai is about glamour, excellence and heights, be it malls, buildings, even parks or whatever.

- Niha Luthra

DUBAI. Dubai is about glamour, excellence and heights, be it malls, buildings, even parks or whatever. The Dubai Airshow is no exception, and I have seen it grow ever since I was a child and it was first held in 1989 on a major scale by Fairs & Exhibition of London. I lived in this beautiful city then. In fact one evening, a day before the show opened in 1991, I was on a drive by the airport with my elder brother Nitin, then 14, who suddenly shouted: Stealth plane. The F-117 was steadily gliding towards the runway and even though it was the darker side of twilight, a keen eye as that of my brother, who was then just 14, could discern it.

One doesn’t have to be a pilot to have some interest in aviation; it can be a passion even for the passengers. Particularly children, and I can say my entire family is child-like when it comes to aircraft and aerospace.

As usual, every edition of the Dubai Airshow is better than the previous one. This is what the organizers have promised, and I’m sure, as a witness to some of them over the years, the Dubai Airshow 2017 is indeed going to be so.

Being held November 12-16, it is going to the biggest in the Middle East, and certainly not far behind in comparison to the others in Europe. The show is very important in every aspect as the six Arab Gulf states are among the biggest spenders on defence, military and civil aviation included, and there has been tension in this strategic oil-rich region particularly after the Iran Iraq war in the 1980s, and later the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and the resulting 1991 war to liberate this important member of the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) alliance.