While new technology and training aids have vastly improved ab initio pilot training, the full benefit of that investment can only be realised if applied by excellent instructors. CAT Europe Editor Chris Long, FRAeS, solicited views on the process from three key individuals at an innovative ATO.

Build a passion in aviation into the process, and the result is teaching which yields the best quality of a new generation of pilots (who are more than quick enough to identify genuine quality and buy into it.) That is the drive for the whole team of passionate individuals at Norwegian-based Pilot Flight Academy (PFA), who have deep aviation experience and are wholeheartedly engaged in the enterprise.

Now equipped with modern Diamond aircraft, PFA has plans to convert to all-electric powered aircraft to achieve the goal of a complete “green” training solution.

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Airlines around the world are beginning to ramp up operations again. CAT Editor Rick Adams, FRAeS, outlines some of the considerations for pilots, cabin crew and maintenance technicians and the retraining required for restarting the engines.

Airlines will use this crisis to accelerate deployment of more efficient aircraft, sending some widebodies into early retirement. Maintenance technicians who have been parking thousands of aircraft on airport ramps will need to return them to flying condition, possibly in short order. Cabin crew, taught for years to engage with passengers, will now be limiting such interaction.

There’s been plenty of bad news, of course. Flight schedules reduced by 90% or more. Airline bankruptcies. Furloughs and layoffs. But there’s some encouraging news as well. Some airlines are beginning to add back routes, even open some new ones. New airlines are being launched. Flight training schools are resuming courses.

Nearly everyone has an opinion on how long it will take the airline industry to return to 2019 passenger levels and the growth levels of the past decade.

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