These Trainees Paid $136K to Become the Next Generation of Airline Pilots

• Skyborne is a pilot training academy with bases in the UK, Florida and India.
• Tuition costs $136,000 for the challenging 70-week course.
• Business Insider spoke with employees and trainees about what it’s like to train to become a commercial pilot.

Skyborn is pilot training academy based at Gloucestershire Airport in southwest England. This year it is enrolling nine 20 cadets on the Air Transport Pilot License (ATPL) course, which costs £105,500 ($136,000).

The company was founded in 2018 and completed construction of its UK base in April 2019. In less than a year, the pandemic would strike, wreaking havoc on the global airline industry.

Carla Booth, Skyborne’s chief commercial officer, told Business Insider: “We were the ones who said, ‘We need to expand because we know things will bounce back and we know they’ll bounce back pretty quickly because airlines have laid off so many pilots.‘”

The company acquired another facility in Vero Beach, Florida, where British cadets spend six months of training. It also trains American pilots and works with Delta Air Lines.

Booth says airlines are “knocking on our doors a lot” looking to hire new pilots.

Consulting firm Oliver Wyman estimates that after a pre-pandemic oversupply, there is a shortfall of approximately 17,000 pilots in North America due to factors such as early retirement, while the global figure could reach nearly 80,000 pilots by 2032 .

Skyborne was further developed after being chosen by the British base for British AirwaysSpeedbird Pilot Academy program, which covers training costs for up to 200 cadets. Booth said the course received about 40,000 applications.

Life in Skybourn

When a new course begins at Skybourne, the cadets move to academy accommodation in nearby Cheltenham. Before classes start, the previous batch will take the newbies to the pub.

As BI toured the academy, there was a palpable sense of camaraderie in the hallways and crew lounges, where bulletin boards advertised running clubs and other extracurricular activities.

One of the two rooms overlooks the Skyborne hangar, where its maintenance crew was working on one of the eight light aircraft parked inside.

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Vicki Harris, director of operations support, says the cadets also spend time with engineers and air traffic controllers.

“It’s really important to us to help trainees build these relationships and break down any barriers that may arise very early in their training,” she adds.

After finishing high school, 21-year-old Skyborne trainee Libby Roebuck spent her first summer post-pandemic working as a cabin crew for TUI Airways, part of the European leisure group.

Flying helicopters with her father throughout her childhood sparked a love of aviation, but high school counselors often suggested flight attendants or the military as careers.

“I think that kind of pushed me to just say, ‘I’m doing this,’ the motivation to just do it,” Roebuck told BI.

There is also the challenge of entering what she called a “male-dominated industry.” According to the International Civil Aviation Organization, only 12% of ATPL Skyborne course participants are women, and female pilots make up only 5% of the total number of pilots in the world.

Roebuck said she has attended many open houses and career events with only one or two women, which has motivated her to continue pushing for change. “Especially since I came back from Florida, I saw a lot more women in the building, which was really nice.”

Ground school, flight school and simulators

The Skyborne pilot course begins with six months of training, which Harris called “really intense” and includes only two seven-day breaks.

Roebuck said she got up at 7 a.m. and was in class or studying until 11 p.m., and worked an additional 12 hours on weekends. “What you put in is what you get out of this course.”

There is also customer service training that involves role-playing different scenarios. “Airlines are really starting to understand how important this is now, much more than perhaps before,” Harriss said.

The cadets then spend the next six months in Florida training to fly single-engine Piper PA-28s before returning to often cloudy England for multi-engine flight training.

It starts in simulators for the twin-engine Diamond DA42 aircraft, before trainees take to the skies and learn to cope with just one engine running.

It also includes an airplane flight course called “Crash Recovery Training,” which teaches techniques to recover an airplane from “unusual attitudes” such as a stall or spiral dive.

The last few weeks are spent learning how to operate in a multi-pilot crew and mastering the skills to fly large aircraft in flight conditions. Boeing 737 Max Simulator — preparation for the reality of working as an airline pilot.

Once hired, airlines are assigned a specific type of aircraft, which typically requires another eight weeks of training.

Booth told BI that the best part of her job was watching the trainees progress over the 18 months. “They have developed and changed so much during this time. It’s great to support them in getting their first job.”

On Skyborne’s UK social media pages, we highlight that trainees are accepting offers from airlines such as British Airways, easyJet, TUI and Jet2.

Roebuck said she is studying for her bachelor’s degree in anticipation of an interview and hopes to become the first officer on an Airbus A320.