This year’s show benefits from recent improvements to infrastructure and facilities as organizer Farnborough International continues a 60-year evolution of development begun by the Society of British Aerospace Companies (SBAC). One of the first examples was a re-landscaping of the exhibition site in 1980 to accommodate continuing growth. SBAC re-routed roads, extended chalet lines westward and increased the South Hall exhibition space to provide an overall total area of 175,000 square feet.
The 1980 event saw some new general-aviation aircraft designs including the curiously bug-like Edgley Optica, designed as a low-speed surveillance aircraft, while France-based Aerospatiale/Socata Tampico pioneered a new light-aircraft family.
Altogether less quiet and peaceful was another French participant, the Dassault-Breguet Mirage 4000, which competed against the General Dynamics F-16, Northrop F-18, McDonnell Douglas F-15 and Panavia Tornado F2 to make the most violent impact on the local Hampshire environment. Another Farnborough newcomer was the Canadair Challenger “widebody” corporate jet.
