It is only day two of the Dubai Air Show, but already almost $1,000bn of deals, before discounts, have been announced. State-owned airline Emirates (current fleet size 111) has placed orders for 93 aircraft, while Dubai Aerospace Enterprise, Dubai’s fledgling leasing business, has ordered 100. Qatar Airways has ordered 57 jets to more than double its fleet. How realistic are the Middle East airline industry’s grandiose expansion plans?

Dubai and Qatar both have ambitions to turn their airports into global hubs. Dubai’s international airport will more than double its passenger handling capacity to 70m a year by 2010, the same as London’s Heathrow. The emirate is building an additional airport, which, by 2017, will be able to handle 120m passengers a year, compared with the 2.1bn passengers carried globally in 2006, according to IATA, the industry body.