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American Morning

In England, Battle For Air Superiority Being Waged

Aired July 22, 2002 - 09:47   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JACK CAFFERTY, CNN ANCHOR: To England now, where a battle for air superiority is being waged by American and European aerospace companies. This is a bigtime fight. The staging ground is one of the world's largest airshows. It comes around every two years. Last time out, $52 billion worth of business done at this thing. The latest best place to see all this, the commercial military aircraft, is where Richard Quest is now in Farnborough, England. He is live at the London airshow.

Good morning.

RICHARD QUEST, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning to you, Jack.

Yes, we are here at Farnborough, which is one of the largest air displays in the world, and they've just started the flying display. I want to take you over there so you can actually see it. This is one of the hawk trainer planes that's now going through its paces way up there into the sky. The noise as it comes overhead will probably drown me out. This has been -- which of course, you would probably say is blessing in disguise.

CAFFERTY: No, not at all.

QUEST: It's gone into the clouds. Hope it doesn't get lost. There he is.

Really what we have seen, what's interesting about this Farnborough, Jack, is that not so much civil aviation between Boeing versus Airbus. This is more about defense, the big companies. Boeing, once again, Lockheed-Martin, Raytheon, and Northrop, are those companies are really doing battle for every penny that's being spent.

Jack, here's comes the hawk trainer.

CAFFERTY: That's pretty neat stuff. You get to go for a ride in one of those?

QUEST: That'll cause you to lose your drink. Listen, you know that in first class without losing your glass of champagne.

CAFFERTY: Here he comes again.

QUEST: I think I feel my lunch moving, Jack. My lunch is moving. CAFFERTY: Keep the camera on the airplane. That's exciting.

QUEST: All right, Jack, we've got plenty more to come, including the Griffin (ph), which of course will be far too noisy, and would even drown me out.

Back to you.

CAFFERTY: All right, Richard Quest, live at the London air show, appreciate you. See you on Friday for our regular edition of "Over There."

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