Last year, on May 24 and 25, 2025, I went to an air show called “Meeting de l’Air 2025”. The organizer is FOSA (French Air Force Social Service Foundation), and the event is held on a rotating basis at air bases around France. Last year it was held at Orleans-Brisey Air Force Base, about 120 km from Paris. As this is a major aviation event that the French Air Force is proud of, we were surprised by the huge number of people who came to the event. About 43,000 people attended the two-day event.
There were many people taking pictures with cameras that looked like they had good performance, airplane enthusiasts who brought chairs and just gazed at the sky, and people who lived nearby or were enjoying themselves with their families as if they were having a picnic.
The “A400M Atlas” attracted much attention. It is a multi-purpose military transport aircraft, capable of transporting up to approximately 37 tons over long distances. The Orleans-Brissy Air Force Base is the only one in France with an A400M.
Personally, I thought the Rafale, a multi-purpose fighter, was beautiful. It was genuinely cool to see it flying dynamically at low altitude. The type I saw was all-French, single-seat, and capable of air control, ground attack, anti-ship, reconnaissance, and even nuclear deterrence.
We saw many other aircraft and demonstrations before heading home. The 2026 air show is scheduled for May 30 and 31 at Cognac-Chateau Bernard Air Force Base.
Since the air show was unexpectedly enjoyable, I decided to visit the Le Bourget Aerospace Museum in the suburbs of Paris a short time later. Located in Le Bourget Airport in northeastern Paris, it is one of the oldest and largest aerospace museums in the world. It is also famous as the site of the Paris Air Show, an international aerospace equipment trade fair held every other year. I had an image that it was somehow far away, but it takes less than an hour by bus from my home in Paris.
The museum is just huge, but the first thing I wanted to see was the “Concorde” and then the “Rafale A” as it relates to the air show.
Two Concorde aircraft are on display at the museum, one an early prototype and the other an actual operational aircraft.
Concorde was the world’s first commercial supersonic airliner, boasting a top speed of approximately Mach 2. However, on July 25, 2000, it crashed shortly after takeoff from Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport. It was a major accident with about 100 victims. I was not yet living in Paris at the time, but my husband vividly remembers the situation in Paris at that time. He told me that there were roadblocks everywhere and it was chaos, and that the French people as a whole were greatly shocked.
Concorde resumed operations in 2001, but due to declining demand and high costs, all Concorde aircraft were retired in 2003.
An early model of the Rafale, the Rafale A first flew in 1986 and was retired in 1994 after 867 flights. It was then donated to the museum in 2009 and is now on public display in the outdoor exhibit area.
Also on display is an Airbus A380 flight test aircraft. Donated by Airbus and open to the public since 2018, the A380 is known as the world’s largest passenger aircraft and features a two-story structure. Although it is no longer in production, it is still in operation in Japan and around the world. At the museum, visitors were able to see the A380 up close and personal, and it was indeed a powerful sight to behold.
The Boeing 747, which was responsible for the golden age of Air France, can also be seen inside. You can also see the first class lounge and the cargo hold by taking out the floor.
There were many interesting exhibits, including the Gondola, the first manned airship to fly successfully in 1872, the Demoiselle, the world’s first light aircraft, completed at the end of 1908, and the Breguet 19, which made a non-stop flight from Paris to New York in 1930. There is also a space section and a planetarium, which is very difficult to see in one day, so I hope to visit again.
As is true of vehicles in general, their appeal lies not in the mere means of transportation, but in the challenge of transporting large quantities of goods fast and far, the joy of piloting them, and their beauty, history, and stories. The air show and museum visit allowed me to fully experience these things.
© Source travel watch