Graham Warwick/WASHINGTON DC
Pan Am International Flight Academy (PAIFA) is to provide ab initio training for KLM Flight Academy. Under a three-year agreement, PAIFA will train up to 120 students a year at its Fort Pierce, Florida, campus.
KLM is closing its US training base in Arizona and has contracted PAIFA's Career Pilot Development division for all single-engine primary training, to be conducted under the airline's European Joint Aviation Authorities Flight Crew Licensing programme. Ground, multi-engine and airline transition training will continue to be provided by KLM Flight Academy at Eeide in the Netherlands.
KLM Flight Academy says PAIFA was selected because of its facilities, aircraft and experience with European training regulations. Fort Pierce is one of two new campuses built by PAIFA since it entered the flight training market in 1999. The other is in Phoenix, Arizona. Together they represent an investment of over $8 million.
The two centres operate 35 Piper training aircraft and have the capacity to train over 900 pilots a year. Some 700 students are expected to enroll this year. PAIFA has a number of training agreements with US regional airlines and says it is negotiating further ab initio deals with flag carriers like KLM.
In another deal, PAIFA has signed a 10-year agreement to provide simulator training for US regional Mesaba Airlines, which operates as Northwest Airlink. Later this year, the companies will open a new training centre in Minneapolis, Minnesota, housing BAE Systems AvroRJ85 and Saab 340B simulators.
The Saab 340 simulator will be relocated from PAIFA's Memphis, Tennessee, centre, where it is being used to train Mesaba pilots. The RJ85 simulator will be installed in 2002. PAIFA ordered an RJ85 simulator from CAE in 1999, but this device is still being defined and a different machine may be ordered for the Mesaba contract.
Source: Flight International
