They do not do things by half in Dubai, and Emirates’ new pilot academy is no exception. The centre, in the emerging “airport city” of Dubai South, has just admitted its first students and will be formally opened on day two of the air show. Designed to meet the fast-growing airline’s need for ab initio pilots and provide a route to the flightdeck for young Emiratis, the main complex is the size of a large high school or college and includes four storeys of classrooms and offices, a four-machine simulator hall, plus accommodation, medical, catering and leisure facilities for up to 600 cadets. The academy even has its own airport, complete with 1,800m runway, control tower and emergency service, divided by a fence from Al Maktoum airport next door.
Emirates announced plans for the academy at the air show in 2011, and at Dubai four years later placed an order for 22 Cirrus SR22s and five Embraer Phenom 100EV twinjets. The first two Cirrus piston singles – in their familiar Emirates livery markedly at the other end of the aircraft spectrum from the airline’s trademark Airbus A380s – were delivered in early September. They were due to be joined by the first Phenom around the time of the show. The first 147 students also arrived that month, some of them already part-way through courses at other schools, others embarking on pilot training for the first time. With the new centre, Emirates now expects to be able to train all its ab initio students in-house, as well as having capacity for up to 300 third-party cadets at any one time.
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Academy head Capt Abdulla Al Hammadi is every bit the proud headmaster as he walks FlightGlobal around the campus. So far, two of the planned six accommodation blocks have been built, and the simulators have still to be installed, but the rest of the facility was ready for students when we visited in early September. The well-appointed bedroom suites, open-air swimming pool, restaurant, and gym packed with modern equipment might resemble an upmarket spa, but the emphasis is very much on creating a learning environment, emphasises Al Hammadi. The bedroom TVs are connected to the internet, to help with evening studies. All students will be expected to stay during the week, even those who live in Dubai, although they will be free to go home at the weekend, as long as they return for a 22:00 Saturday curfew.
The new Emirates flight training campus at Dubai South is the size of a large college
Emirates
In the classrooms, the students – currently all Emiratis but from next year other nationalities will join them – will participate in the interactive lessons using tablets. “Everyone will be connected with the instructor in real time,” explains Al Hammadi. Cadets will graduate from the three- to three-and-a-half-year course in tranches of about 60 – the ceremony marked in a 400-seat auditorium. While the programme will not offer an Emirates-specific multi-crew pilot’s licence or MPL, students “will have the unique advantage of being introduced to airline operations from the very beginning of the course”, says Emirates. Multi-crew co-operation, advanced jet orientation and line-oriented flight training will be part of the prospectus in what the airline promises will be “the most advanced flight training academy in the world”.
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Source: Flight International
