Turkish Airlines invests on 2nd aviation academy

By Charumini de Silva  in turkey

Turkey’s flag carrier, the Turkish Airlines (THY) aiming to become the world’s largest airline by 2021 is setting up its second aviation academy at the Ataturk International Airport on the European side of Istanbul to be completed by first quarter of next year.

The second Turkish Aviation Academy will be built with a significant investment, which would be operating under Turkish Technic, a subsidiary of THY where approximately 4,000 cockpit crews, dispatchers and loadmasters as well as about 10,000 cabin crew come either for the first time to learn the skills required to become part of Turkish Airways, or to complete mandatory recurrent training sessions.

“Turkish Airlines has always considered training to be an important aspect of the business and the numbers are increasing significantly every year,” Turkish Airlines Senior Vice President – Flight Training Captain Sedat Sekerci told the journalists at a media tour hosted by the airline in Istanbul, Turkey recently. 

Turkish Technic aims high with new facility 

Given the growing fleet, the airline has now two days a week dedicated to bring in new pilots. To keep up with the demand for new pilot training, with the completion of the new facility the Academy will have 18 simulators in total and a capacity to train 5,800 students annually.

The training centre has adopted a digital approach with state-of-the-art technologies, in order to match with the ever-changing learning habit of people. The facility at present has 10 full-flight simulator (FFS) docks, for the different aircraft that Turkish Airlines has in the fleet, from Boeing 737 and Airbus A320 family aircraft (with 3 FFS each) to the Boeing 777-300ER and Airbus A330 / A340 (with two FFS each). These FFS have a 24/7 operation at its full capacity.

He asserted that the new facility is situated on a 25,000 square meters area, containing 32 classrooms with capacity of 640 seats.

Turkish Aviation Academy was founded to meet the training needs of Turkish Airlines and it has transformed over the years into an institution that offers training courses to people from many different companies both in Turkey and abroad. At present the airline has 4,200 pilots and 10,042 cabin crew members.

“We not only cultivate on the human capital, but also provide training and consultancy services for domestic and international aviation organisations,” he pointed out.

Today over 1,000 pilots from Turkish and other carriers from around the world come to the Aviation Academy. “As Turkish Airlines continues to grow we hope to attract and train more top quality women pilots as we strongly believe in equal opportunities and diversity in the workplace,” Sekerci stressed.  

Cabin crew training

Turkish Airlines Cabin Chief and Instructor Evin Kurutluoglu said the flight attendants are not only trained under the national and international standards, but also turn them into experts in hospitality, a key characteristic that the carrier is proud of since its humble beginnings always consistent to the culture, brand and identity of Turkish Airlines.

She pointed out that it is a very are simulation facility which has five stations where they perform hands on drills for the cabin attendance with water beside each other. The academy has a five cabin simulators for the A320, A330 and Boeing737.

“Each year these 10,000 cabin attendance come back to the academy here and have a recurrent training for two days. The training is never over for a cabin attendance,” Kurutluoglu added. 

Expertise

Currently Turkish Aviation Academy has over 30 trainers, all experts in their fields, whereby 1,300 people can be delivered training at the same time. Approximately 2,000 classroom trainings are conducted annually in which nearly 30,000 students participate. Moreover, the number of distance learning has reached over 100,000.

“We continue to be one of the leading aviation training centres in Turkey utilising expert trainers and a quality training approach,” Sekerci added.

The academy combines years of experience with the latest developments in the aviation industry to train airline companies and corporations such as courier companies, travel agencies, universities and airport operators in the fields of reservation and sales, cargo, dangerous goods, passenger services, ramp, lost luggage, security, ICAO travel documents, organisational development, heliport, personal development, professional development, marketing, IATA, air transport management master program, general language, aviation English, cabin English and fear of flying program.

Turkish Aviation Academy in the early years has only provided training for pilots and aircraft mechanics. However, with the development of the aviation industry over time the need for a training department arose where the firm began to carry out training activities in a more systematic manner.