Arabian Aerospace Magazine made a nice review on EGYPTAIR TRAINING CENTER "School that's filled with an air of history", published in ISSUE 3, VOLUME 2, August-October 2010. Read On
With its youthful fleet and advanced attitude to service enhancements such as passenger connectivity, EgyptAir is as modern-minded an airline as you’ll find anywhere. But the Egyptian national carrier also has a proud 80-year history as the oldest airline in the Arab domain and one of the oldest in the world, and it goes to some lengths remind its employees of their heritage.
So when novice pilots, engineers and support staff show up for their first day at the EGYPTAIR TRAINING CENTER at Cairo International, one of the first things they learn is that the site contains a museum to the airline’s history.
Taking pride of place among the exhibits is the simulator on which Egyptian pilots perfected their Boeing 707 skills in the 1970s. The training days of this vintage system are long behind it, but elsewhere in the centre its modern successors are hard at work.
The latest addition to the centre is the S-Building,opened at the beginning of the year and so called for its shape in plan. A cool and elegant circular lobby gives access to nearly a hundred state-of-the-art classrooms and to a simulator facility currently housing four JAR Level D-certificated systems and with room for another four.
The simulators reflect the make-up of the EGYPTAIR fleet – one each for the Boeing 737-800 and 
777-200ER, and the Airbus A320 family and A330/A340. But they are also heavily used by third-party customers, among them Air India, Austrian Airlines, Kenya Airways, Kuwait Airways, PIA, Sudan Airways and Wataniya of Kuwait. Third parties account for 50 per cent of the simulators’ working time and EGYPTAIR goes to some lengths to accommodate them: the A320 unit, for example, can simulate both the CFM56 engines that power its own aircraft but also the IAE V2527, the alternative powerplant widely used by other carriers.
A typical session in the Thales-supplied A320 simulator begins with a briefing in an adjoining classroom equipped with a flight management system trainer (FMTS) – a full set of flight-deck instrumentation displayed on active highresolution touch-sensitive LCD screens.
“We use the FMST to introduce the trainee to the planned sortie,” explained VP and training consultant Hassan Mohamed Abdou. “The pupil and instructor together set the parameters for the day’s exercise, upload them and then go fly. This allows us to make the best possible use of expensive time in the full-motion simulator.”
The newest simulator in the facility is the 737-800 unit, supplied by FlightSafety Simulation in January last year, and there are more to come. “We plan to add an Embraer 170/190 system to support our EgyptAir Express regional subsidiary,” said Abdou. “And we are looking at adding another A320-family unit to meet the constantly growing demand from third parties. We have vacant bays ready and waiting for these systems.”
In the maintime, the facility gets tow simulators for the price of one with its A330/A340 unit. “We can convert this from one type to the other in just 20 minutes by swapping out modules for the throttles and other functions,” said Abdou. “At present we make the switch once every two weeks to support initial and continuation training for our A330 and A340 flight crew.”
The training needs of the airline’s other employees – cabin crew, engineers and office staff – are met by three floors of well-equipped classrooms and a hangar full of cabin service and emergency procedures trainers.
“Our centre is one of the largest of its kind in the Middle East and Africa,” said Abdou. “Earlier this year we were the first in the region to obtain Joint Airworthiness Authorities certification as a type rating training organisation (TRTO). And we run more than a thousand different courses every year.”
As well as pilot ground school, those courses cover standard and emergency procedures in the cabin, engineer and ground equipment training, and tuition in a wide range of commercial,administrative, financial, customer service and security functions.
Teaching takes place in a total of 94 spacious classrooms spread over three floors. Distributed either side of broad, marble-floored corridors, the FAA-standard rooms are variously sized for classes of up to six, 12 and 18 people. “This gives us the flexibility we need to make the most of our available capacity,” commented Abdou. Classes running at the time of the Arabian Aerospace visit included one for customer care staff – 15 men and women trainees under the guidance of two female instructors – and one for 777-300 pursers.
Classrooms are equipped with modern teaching aids – whiteboards, PCs for computerbased training, projectors and screens. One room dedicated to flight crew ground school features procedures trainers designed and built by the airline. Each pupil station comprises a PC monitor and slide-out paper graphics depicting the actual layout of controls and instruments on the flight deck. The latter are used to lend a measure of realism as exercises are carried out with the computer screens.
Realism is also a priority in the cabin service hangar. Alongside several full-scale fuselage sections used to train flight attendants in their normal duties and responsibilities, and the cabin service products, stands the cabin emergency evacuation trainer (CEET). This is similar to the cabin service units but with one big difference – inflatable evacuation slides can be deployed on either side, one of them into a swimming pool to simulate a touchdown on water. “We believe we’re unique in having all of these capabilities in one location,” said Abdou.
The carrier also takes an exceptional interest inthe fitness and turnout of its crews. It isintroducing physical training programmes specially tailored to pilots, cabin staff and securityoperatives, and the cabin service hangar features a “grooming room” to provide flight attendants with tips on looking good and caring for their uniforms.
Ultimately responsible for the performance ofthe centre is training VP Capt El Motasem Bellah,who expresses himself satisfied with its contribution to the prosperity of the EgyptAir Group. “In the past year we utilised all our simulators at around the international norm of 5,000hr per annum,” he said. “We did even better with the A320 unit, which recorded more than 6,000hr. Our overall operation again generated a profit. And we achieved all this despite the recession.”
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