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The airline industry is in need of thousands of flight attendants to keep up with post-COVID demand.
Aspiring crew members must go through vigorous training to learn things like slide deployments and medical treatment.
Insider toured Air New Zealand’s training facility in Auckland to learn more about the specific courses.
The airline industry is quickly getting back to pre-pandemic levels, with the International Air Transport Association (IATA) predicting an industry-wide recovery of 103% by 2024.Empty airline seats.
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Source: IATA
As demand grows and carriers continue to add new routes and planes, they will need more flight crews to work them.Airline pilot walking through an airport.
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A significant labor source for airlines is flight attendants.Flight attendant at Denver International Airport.
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Consumer and market data company Statista says the North American aviation industry will need 170,000 cabin crew members over the next 20 years to keep up with demand.
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Source: Statista
To become a flight attendant, new hires must go through a long, intensive training course before working an actual flight.Singapore Airlines’ crash simulator and safety training equipment.
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Training includes everything from emergency procedures and self-defense to customer service and medical treatment.Singapore Airlines water landing simulator.
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To get a glimpse into the world of flight attendant training, I toured Air New Zealand’s Academy of Learning in Auckland — here’s what I learned.
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Arriving at the center, I was impressed by the size of the facility, which had a reception area, classrooms, cabin mockups, and a large lounge area.The lounge area is huge to accommodate the dozens of current and trainee flight attendants going through the center every week.
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Anne-Maree O’Leary, ANZ’s cabin crew training manager, told Insider the site welcomes up to 120 new hires a month, with an average of 20 a week starting every Monday, though some weeks they have 40.
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“We’re bringing intakes from off-the-street, so new into the aviation industry or they have worked for other carriers many years ago, but they aren’t rehires,” she said.An Air New Zealand business class flight attendant.
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O’Leary explained that the number is significant because pre-COVID they were hiring about 200 crew members per year across all fleets.
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Aspiring crew members must complete four weeks of vigorous training before working a commercial flight, which includes emergency procedures, first aid, security, and customer service.The classroom where current and trainee flight attendants take exams or do computer-based training.
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While new hires go through the facility, current flight attendants will also visit for annual recurrent training to keep their certificates up to date.Current flight attendants going through recurrent customer service training.
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Moreover, flight attendants who are upgrading to serving business class or becoming a flight lead will need specific training for the role.An Air New Zealand business class flight attendant.
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Ground personnel, mechanics, and some engineers will also use the facility for various purposes.Inside one of the hangars were small aircraft where Air New Zealand apprentices work and learn to hopefully land a role as a mechanic.
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The first stop on our tour was in the Cabin Emergency Evacuation Trainer, which employees named Athena.
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The mock cabin resembles an Airbus A320 airliner, which is the workhorse of ANZ’s narrowbody fleet.
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A320 aircrew trainer Melissa Gerritsen-Fridh told Insider that the cabin is a hybrid between two A320 variants, meaning the two sides of the cabin are slightly different.
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ANZ also uses the cabin for some widebody training, but the company is soon getting a new, larger mockup that will have two aisles to replace its old widebody training cabins.
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The A320’s several rows of seats mean the cabin could double as a training classroom to discuss the procedures and expectations.
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There was also a galley area in the front and aft of the cabin…
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…a cockpit with two pilot dummies at the controls…
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…a lavatory, complete with one of ANZ’s signature wallpaper designs…
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…overhead bins, only two of which could open and hold emergency equipment…
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…TV screens for presentations and warnings…
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…evacuation doors, which trainees must master how to use…
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…a panel to control things like lights, doors, and temperature…
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…and a station to simulate emergencies, like fires, water landings, and depressurization.The station was in the aft right of the mock cabin, which also had a screen that displayed security cameras that were throughout the cabin.
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The flight attendant trainers demonstrated a fire evacuation scenario for media, which include smoke and alarms.Fake fire showed on the windows to simulate the emergency event.
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When the alarm sounded, crew members shouted specific commands, like “stay seated,” then one opened the door, and, in unison, they all instructed us to evacuate the plane.The flight attendants shouting commands as smoke filled the cabin.
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We left through the left-side emergency door towards the aft of the airplane as smoke filled the cabin.The smoke dissipated a few minutes later.
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On the floor, ANZ has painted a slide to give a visual reference of what it will look like when deployed as passengers will use this to exit instead of just walking out.We evacuated in a covered room to the left of the A320 mock cabin.
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After we re-entered the mockup, Gerritsen-Fridh dropped the oxygen masks and a loud voice came over the speakers with instructions on how to use the them.
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Unfortunately for the trainers, the masks do not automatically retract, so they have to manually put them back.
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Trainers will also simulate anomaly events, like jammed evacuation doors and failed slide deployments to ensure flight attendants are ready for anything.
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Because Athena is on the ground, trainees cannot actually deploy the slides, so that is done in a different room with an elevated cabin, which is the current widebody mockup.
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Here, flight attendants will practice going down the slide, as well as do swim tests and get on a real raft in case of water landings.The slide was sturdy and hard, with pads at the bottom.
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Trainees will also learn how to operate the doors on widebody planes, including the Boeing 777 and Boeing 787.
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In addition to emergency procedures, the A320 mock cabin is used for normal operations, like pre-flight briefings, including passengers with disabilities and unaccompanied minors.
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“Its better to be in this environment because trainees get an idea of how everything feels and moves, so it’s good situational awareness,” Gerritsen-Fridh told Insider.Trainers demonstrating commands and hand signals.
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ANZ pilots will also receive emergency procedures training in Athena, but there is a separate simulator center for their flight training, O’Leary told Insider.The Air New Zealand pilots who flew the inaugural flight from New York to Auckland in September.
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Behind Athena is a fire trainer named Prometheus.
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This is where cabin crew and pilots get practical experience putting out fires in things like ovens, overhead bins, and laptops.
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Gerritsen-Fridh demonstrated putting out a laptop fire, which included sounding an alarm and using a fire extinguisher.
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While ANZ will do as much in Athena as possible, customer service training has separate classrooms with different mockups.This mockup had premium economy and business class seats.
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Here, new and current flight attendants will receive specific training for things like passenger interaction, serving business class, and using galley carts.
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Flight attendants can upgrade to business after six months of employment and must learn special procedures, like plating, O’Leary said.An Air New Zealand business class flight attendant converting the seat into a bed.
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During our visit, we saw veteran flight attendants in the business class mockup learning about new wine offerings onboard so they can explain to customers.
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Also in the room were glass dishes and amenity kits, which are used in premium cabins.
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O’Leary told Insider that customer service training is not required by law, but ANZ requires it annually to maintain a high standard of service.A diagram of a seat map on the wall of the academy.
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In another room was an economy mockup, where new hires learn how to service the cabin, including the Skycouch.
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After seeing the mockups, we learned about one of the most important parts of flight attendant training — medical and first aid.A class of trainees working on their medical course during our tour.
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Walking to the classroom, I noticed people wearing flight attendant uniforms, which O’Leary told Insider is required starting week three, except during medical and security training.
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To be hired as an ANZ flight attendant, applicants must already have their CPR license and must complete a two-day external course with St. John before training begins.
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“What we do here at the facility is the add-on portion of medical training that is specifically in an aviation environment,” O’Leary explained.There were desks and a small cabin mockup in the classroom.
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ANZ has three medical trainers that are EMT qualified, meaning they are the best of the best for this highly important course. O’Leary said trainees can ask in-depth questions to give the context of why they perform certain treatments.Aircrew trainer Susan McCapra is one of the specially qualified medical professionals. She can provide detailed explanations on how diabetes, for example, works in the body, which offers more context for trainees rather than just telling them to follow generic instructions.
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Medical training is two days and future flight attendants learn things like using oxygen tanks, creating an airway, and using epidural pens.
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Aircrew trainer Susan McCapra, who is one of the three people with special medical qualifications, explained that aviation medicine is all hands-on learning: “We take them through all the equipment we have and they go around in groups to practice.”
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On the day we visited, we saw trainees practicing CPR in groups of three — one doing compressions, one on the resuscitator mask, and one on the defibrillator.Trainees already know how to conduct CPR, but this group training builds on that in an aviation setting.
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Part of the equipment is a huge medical kit kept onboard, which is color coded and has items that a doctor could use to perform an operation onboard.
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I noticed the kit is much more comprehensive than ones I’ve seen in the US, with O’Leary telling Insider that not all items are required, but chosen to be included by ANZ’s doctors and medical unit.There is one kit on the narrowbody planes, and two on widebody jets like the Boeing 787.
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Once they’ve gone through the course, McCapra told Insider that trainees must pass a test to officially complete the medical portion of the training.
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“If they fail an exam, they get another chance, but if they fail another one then it’s a conversation with cabin managers, but there is a standard they have to meet,” she explained.An Air New Zealand flight attendant serving the economy cabin on a Boeing 787 Dreamliner.
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The exam requires a trainee to pick a random card and perform whatever it says, like when and how to use an oxygen tank, for example.McCapra said they not only have to learn how to use the oxygen tanks but also how to properly attach the tanks to the seat to keep the aisle clear during flight.
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According to McCapra, ANZ had about 150 oxygen-related events a week pre-COVID, so it is imperative flight attendants know how to properly use them.Passengers on an Air New Zealand flight.
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McCapra also explained that crew members will face sometimes emotionally draining situations onboard, like the death of a passenger, but ANZ has created an employee assistance program to help flight attendants and pilots after major events.Air New Zealand 787.
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One of the other important courses flight attendants must go through is security training, which includes things like self-defense, disarming, and de-escalation.
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During our tour, we saw a class using dummies and punching bags to practice, which is led by New Zealand police.
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While it is impossible to learn every detail of a flight attendant’s four-week training in just two hours, I was thoroughly impressed by the facility.
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As opposed to popular belief, flight attendants are not just glorified customer service agents, but rather they are necessary, and sometimes life-saving, safety professionals.Boeing 787 emergency evacuation door training.
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If you’re an aspiring flight attendant anywhere in the world, the training will not be easy, so be prepared to commit to vigorous tests and procedures before becoming an airline crew member.The Air New Zealand flight attendants that worked the carrier’s inaugural flight from New York to Auckland.
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