Qantas Pilot Academy students have the world ahead of them

Now is the perfect time for students to start their aviation careers.

Student pilots Kimberley Pike and Thomas Fanshawe . Official opening of Qantas Group Pilot Academy at Wellcamp Airport. Wednesday, 29th Jan, 2020. Picture: Nev Madsen

THE student pilots at the new Toowoomba USQ and Qantas training facility are entering the aviation industry at probably the best time ever for future careers. 

By the time they finish training the COVID crises will have been overcome and the skies will fill up again with eager travellers.

Many of the 6000 retrenched Qantas employees will not return and older pilots may take early retirement. 

For many, a door has closed but for others new doors open. 

Our daughter Zoe had a wonderful career in the airline, working in the Sydney headquarters in a team that planned aircraft movements and routes. 

She elected to leave just before retrenchment, with her externally completed M.A. in international business studies and flew to Singapore, just before the border lockdown. 

She was soon employed by Microsoft in a business capacity.

Other Qantas employees may not be so fortunate, but they should take solace in what was their career place in what is still the safest and one of the great airlines of the world. 

The students in our city studying to become pilots have a great future ahead of them.

PETER KNOBEL, Toowoomba

Originally published as Qantas Pilot Academy students have the world ahead of them