United Airlines began accepting applications for its flight academy on Tuesday, part of an effort to hire 10,000 pilots by 2030, as more of its aviators reach the federal government’s 65-year retirement age.
The airline announced in February 2020 that it had purchased an aviation school, but the Covid pandemic forced it to suspend training plans. United is now resuming plans to replenish the ranks of pilots and prepare for growth as travel demand returns. Last week, he said he would start hiring pilots again, starting with 300 candidates whose hiring process was interrupted by the pandemic.
United’s flight school aims to provide training to pilots with little or no experience. United has said it wants to train 5,000 pilots and wants half of them to be women and people of color. Just over 7% of United’s more than 12,000 drivers are women and 13% are people of color, United said.
The first class of 20 pilots will begin in the third quarter with a graduation date sometime in the first half of 2022, United said.
A pilot rides United Airlines planes as they stop at the gates of San Francisco International Airport on April 12, 2020 in San Francisco, California.
Justin Sullivan | Getty Images
United and other airlines have increased the recruitment of pilots in recent years. Students will be able to enroll in United’s Aviate recruitment program, which extends conditional job offers to candidates as they gain experience during training and working with smaller operators. It may take a student about five years from the start of flight school to get a job at United.
United declined to say how much the aviation academy would cost students, but said it would fund $ 1.2 million in grants “to break the financial barriers that limit access to the airline pilot career for generations of women and people of JPMorgan Chase said this will provide an additional $ 1.2 million in grants to help increase diversity.