It now seems that Airbus has been able to beat out its bitter rival Boeing at the Dubai Air Show by receiving five times more orders by value. Airbus, the European plan maker, has received $5.3 billion in orders and letters of intent. This is being put up against two orders for Boeing worth $800 million.

Despite this great news, sales were down dramatically from the last time the biannual show was held in 2007. It was then that both aircraft makers received a combined order worth more than $75 billion. As people can clearly see, this year did not even come close to reaching that figure.

John Leahy, the Airbus chief operating officer, said that they had a good air show, or at least better than what they had expected. He said that the industry is not out of the woods just yet. There will be a difficult winter ahead of them. However, with the deals they made at the Dubai Air Show and the interest in their products that they saw, a recovery may not be too far off.

Ethiopian Airlines has recently placed an order for 12 Airbus A350-900s worth $2.9 billion, as well as sales for two A380 super jumbos. Boeing announced deals for 11 737-800 jetliner to Air Algerie and Tassili Airlines.

Although it was great that both aircraft makers were able to get some orders from airlines, these orders are still not up to par with what they should be. Airbus feels like a recovery could be close at hand, but other airline experts feel differently. Either way, they all agree on one thing, and that is the fact that it is going to be a very long winter for the industry as a whole.