AAA UAE celebrates 10th anniversary

Alpha Aviation Academy UAE (AAA) has formally celebrated its10th anniversary with a ceremony at its base in Sharjah, UAE.

Since receiving its first batch ten years ago, AAA hastrained over 600 cadets via the MPL course, with most graduates securing aposition as an Airbus A320 Second Officer.

One of the academy’s key focuses since its founding has beendiversity: the 330 graduates from 51 batches to date are from over 67 differentcountries.

With just 3 percent of the world’s commercial pilots beingfemale, equal focus has been placed on empowering women to become pilots.Currently 20 female cadets are training with Alpha, with a further 28 havingpreviously graduated.

Furthermore, in a move to encourage current professionals toundertake pilot training, AAA has recently extended the upper age limit oncadets training for the MPL licence from 33 years of age to 35. Professionalswho have gone on to train at AAA include former doctors and lawyers.

In recent months AAA has also started a programme ofinternational expansion, securing partnerships with Airways Aviation(Australia), Etihad Airways (UAE), and sister group Alpha Aviation Group(Philippines) for the delivery of the Core Flying Skills components of AAA’spilot training programme.

AAA’s latest diversity drive to attract as many cadets aspossible comes both during the UAE Year of Tolerance and as it is predicted afurther 635,000 commercial pilots will be required to meet industry demand by2037.

The 10th anniversary ceremony at AAA, which took place onMonday 15 April, was attended by over 150 guests including guests of honour BhanuChoudhrie – shareholder and director of Alpha Aviation Group (AAG); Sultan AlZara – director of Licensing Department at General Civil Aviation Authority(GCAA); Guest Speaker Captain Dieter Harms – the “Father of MPL”; Air ArabiaGroup; Alpha Aviation Group Philippines; Airways Aviation; Cozmo Travel; andAAA cadets and graduates.

The event saw keynote speeches and an awards ceremonyhighlighting the achievements of AAA employees, associates, cadets, graduatesand future AAA ambassadors.