Eurocopter inaugurates extension of its Aviation Training Academy in Kassel just in time for the institute’s 40th anniversary

Euro­copter, the inter­na­tion­al­ly lead­ing Ger­man-French-Span­ish heli­copter man­u­fac­tur­er, inau­gu­rat­ed a new build­ing com­plex at its Avi­a­tion Train­ing Acad­e­my today in the Mar­bach­höhe Tech­nol­o­gy Park near Kas­sel, Ger­many, as part of its 40th anniver­sary cel­e­bra­tion. The ground-break­ing for the 1,000 square meter build­ing took place on April 13, mean­ing that the exten­sion has been com­plet­ed in only five months—just in time for the institute’s anniver­sary. Bertram Hilgen, city may­or of Kas­sel, Dr Wolf­gang Schoder, CEO of Euro­copter Deutsch­land GmbH and Detlef Ehrig, Direc­tor Train­ing Acad­e­my Euro­copter Deutsch­land GmbH as well as Jean-Pierre Arnaud, Rule­mak­ing Offi­cer at the Euro­pean Avi­a­tion Safe­ty Agency (EASA), all attend­ed the offi­cial open­ing cer­e­mo­ny in Kassel. 

Mar­bach­höhe Tech­nol­o­gy Park near Kas­sel, Ger­many Source: Euro­copter, Den­nis Hädel­er Click to enlarge

Sev­er­al mil­lion euros have been invest­ed in the con­struc­tion project. The expan­sion of the facil­i­ties for prac­ti­cal avi­a­tion train­ing and for train­ing units of the Ger­man armed forces also offers room for a seg­ment of an Air­bus A310 air­frame, an EC135, three BO105s and sev­er­al air­craft parts. 

The acad­e­my can cur­rent­ly pro­vide train­ing to up to 350 trainees at one time. “The aim is to strength­en this capac­i­ty in the com­ing years with the new build­ing and offer addi­tion­al attrac­tive cours­es for the Ger­man armed forces and civ­il avi­a­tion cus­tomers,” explained Detlef Ehrig, head of the Train­ing Acad­e­my, Euro­copter Deutsch­land GmbH. “In con­nec­tion with the expan­sion project, addi­tion­al train­ing areas have been cre­at­ed on site and in future it will be pos­si­ble to pro­vide instruc­tion in avi­a­tion tech­nol­o­gy with a stronger trainee- and prob­lem-ori­ent­ed approach.” 

“In the new facil­i­ties cre­at­ed with the expan­sion of our Train­ing Acad­e­my, we can now offer one of the most com­pre­hen­sive train­ing pro­grams for the heli­copter indus­try in Europe,” stat­ed Dr. Wolf­gang Schoder, CEO of Euro­copter Deutsch­land GmbH. “The com­pet­i­tive­ness of the Ger­man train­ing cen­ter will also cre­ate addi­tion­al poten­tial for inter­na­tion­al train­ing projects in the industry.” 

The expand­ed cen­ter of excel­lence for basic avi­a­tion train­ing is ful­ly aligned with Eurocopter’s strat­e­gy. Stronger focus will be placed on inter­na­tion­al aspects of a cus­tomer-ori­ent­ed and com­pre­hen­sive ser­vice offer­ing. As a lead­ing heli­copter man­u­fac­tur­er, the com­pa­ny will include the basic train­ing of tech­ni­cal and fly­ing per­son­nel as a per­ma­nent com­po­nent in the range of ser­vices it offers. Up to now Euro­copter Deutsch­land GmbH has main­ly con­cen­trat­ed on the local mar­ket for its cus­tomer base, both in the air­plane as well as in the heli­copter sec­tor, but from now efforts to strength­en the inter­na­tion­al dimen­sion of its train­ing activ­i­ties will be stepped up. Ini­tial talks about pos­si­ble part­ner­ships are already being con­duct­ed in the exist­ing inter­na­tion­al net­work with Chi­na, Malaysia and the Mid­dle East. 

The spec­trum of activ­i­ties offered by the Euro­copter Train­ing Acad­e­my
The inte­grat­ed Train­ing Acad­e­my of Euro­copter Train­ing Ser­vices is unique in com­bin­ing the tech­ni­cal exper­tise of all the spe­cial­ized sec­tors of a world-lead­ing avi­a­tion group. Since its ear­ly days in 1970, the Kas­sel Train­ing Acad­e­my has devel­oped into one of Germany’s biggest providers of basic train­ing in the avi­a­tion field and is approved by EASA. 

Com­pa­nies in the avi­a­tion indus­try along with their main­te­nance oper­a­tions, in addi­tion to air­lines, mil­i­tary agen­cies, gov­ern­ment insti­tu­tions, fed­er­al and state police forces and a very wide range of small and medi­um-size com­pa­nies, all draw on the broad spec­trum of train­ing cov­ered by the academy’s spe­cial­ist port­fo­lio. What’s more, as a trust­ed part­ner, Euro­copter sup­ports the Ger­man armed forces in the train­ing of its tech­ni­cal per­son­nel in civil­ian trades and occu­pa­tions. This ranges from train­ing air­craft mechan­ics and elec­tron­ic tech­ni­cians for avi­a­tion sys­tems to train­ing for the indus­tri­al fore­man qual­i­fi­ca­tion in avi­a­tion tech­nol­o­gy. Spe­cial atten­tion is giv­en to the inte­gra­tion of EASA-cer­ti­fied train­ing, such as the Cer­ti­fy­ing Staff CAT A or CAT B1 (EASA job titles). 

Euro­copter train­ing, the key to safe­ty and effi­cien­cy
With 19 train­ing cen­ters through­out the world, Euro­copter is active­ly pur­su­ing its strat­e­gy of deploy­ing sim­u­la­tors world­wide to improve flight safe­ty, reduce train­ing costs and max­i­mize train­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties for the ben­e­fit of its cus­tomers. Flight sim­u­la­tors are capa­ble of sim­u­lat­ing the tough­est and most com­plex mis­sions in com­plete safe­ty regard­less of air­craft avail­abil­i­ty, thus mak­ing them an appro­pri­ate, cost-effec­tive and attrac­tive train­ing solu­tion. Train­ing pro­vid­ed by Euro­copter is cer­ti­fied in accor­dance with the require­ments of EASA, FAA and oth­er nation­al avi­a­tion author­i­ties such as CAAS, CAAC, TCCA, ANAC, and CASA. 

About Euro­copter
Estab­lished in 1992, the Fran­co-Ger­man-Span­ish Euro­copter Group is a Divi­sion of EADS, a world leader in aero­space, defence and relat­ed ser­vices. The Euro­copter Group employs approx. 15,600 peo­ple. In 2009, Euro­copter con­firmed its posi­tion as the world’s No. 1 heli­copter man­u­fac­tur­er in the civ­il and para­pub­lic mar­ket, with a turnover of 4.6 bil­lion Euros, orders for 344 new heli­copters, and a 52 per­cent mar­ket share in the civ­il and para­pub­lic sec­tors. Over­all, the Group’s prod­ucts account for 30 per­cent of the total world heli­copter fleet. Its strong world­wide pres­ence is ensured by its 18 sub­sidiaries on five con­ti­nents, along with a dense net­work of dis­trib­u­tors, cer­ti­fied agents and main­te­nance cen­tres. More than 10,500 Euro­copter heli­copters are cur­rent­ly in ser­vice with over 2,800 cus­tomers in more than 140 coun­tries. Euro­copter offers the largest civ­il and mil­i­tary heli­copter range in the world. 

For more infor­ma­tion, please contact: 

Pas­cale FLEURY:
Tel: + 33 (0)4 42 85 62 38
Mob: + 33 (06) 32 54 05 02
pascale.fleury@eurocopter.com

Source:
Eurocopter 

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