The top executives at Airbus, Boeing and Embraer are united in the belief that - despite the ongoing global economic turmoil - they've all sensed a slackening off in delivery deferral activity by their customers.
This comes after signals during the Paris air show that Seattle and Toulouse could see an end to the gloom - albeit only when using a high-powered telescope.
The fact is though that 2009 will set a new bench mark for jet airliner deliveries, with shipments on course to surpass 1,100 units. So delight at any indications of a recovery must be tempered - as should any temptation by the airframers and their supply chains to stop hovering their feet over the production brake pedal - until there is more supporting economic data.
As Embraer chief Fred Curado cautions, the recovery signals are "too faint yet" to be convincing.
There is also the good news from EADS boss Louis Gallois that cancellations have been "surprisingly limited" so far - from Airbus's perspective, at least - and that the industry is still not "in a panic" as in the past.
But as Boeing's Scott Carson pointed out at Le Bourget in June: "There is certainly no certainty in being able to predict the future."
So perhaps the age-old adage is more apt than ever: that might be light we can see at the end of the tunnel - but it could also be the front of a train that is travelling headlong towards us.
Source: Flight International
