| Wagga Wagga has been carefully selected as the site for the Australian Airline Pilot Academy (AAPA) as it possesses ideal training conditions not found anywhere else in Australia. | |
| Conducive weather for training | |
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One of the critical success factors for any pilot training facility is the year round weather conditions. In this respect the weather at Wagga Wagga is particularly conducive. The prevailing wind is generally light and in line with the main runway. Adverse weather events are very low frequency and on average fewer than 10 days a year are lost to poor weather and are mainly due to fog on winter mornings. |
| Extensive training area | |
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The Wagga Wagga flying training area is one of the largest in Australia and encompasses an area of approximately 540 square nautical miles with an aerobatic area of approximately 90 square nautical miles. AAPA’s training area as shown in this image (click to view) comprises mostly flat farming fields providing extensive areas in which to conduct safe emergency landings. There are also several farmers’ landings strips in the training area allowing emergency procedures training to be conducted safely to ground level. The flight training area is out of the way of airline flights from Wagga Wagga to Melbourne and Sydney with only occasional itinerant traffic flying en-route to other destinations. The training area also allows unrestricted operations outside controlled airspace up to 10,000 feet enabling great flexibility in training. Wagga Wagga is free from the traffic, weather and airspace restrictions that exist at the large capital city secondary airports. |
| Runway options |  |
The runway configuration at Wagga Wagga allows for both sealed and unsealed training operations and both runways are currently under capacity allowing for increased utilisation and minimal training delays. The main runway is of more than sufficient length (1768m or 5800’) for high performance aircraft to be used in training if required. |
| Instrument landing system | |
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Wagga Wagga is also one of the few regional airports in Australia equipped with an Instrument Landing System (ILS) – a precision approach guidance system normally found only at major capital city airports. The Federal government, in line with the establishment of AAPA at Wagga Wagga, provided a grant of over $1million for the ILS which has been operational since November 2010. This is a major advantage for flight training at Wagga Wagga as students do not waste hours travelling to other aerodromes to complete ILS training, an essential part of the Instrument Rating syllabus. |
| Exposure to commercial Regular Public Transport (RPT) operations | |
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There are several RPT airline carriers, such as Rex Airlines, operating into and out of Wagga Wagga which offers Airline Cadets valuable exposure to such commercial RPT operations during their training. |
| Synergies with parent company | |
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There are also significant synergies with Rex infrastructure and resources in Wagga Wagga such as the heavy maintenance base and administrative support functions. This allows the sharing of specialised airline resources and procedures with the Academy and also efficiencies with aircraft maintenance that is now controlled by Rex’s Wagga Wagga Engineering base. The AAPA aircraft maintenance programme is run by Rex’s System of Maintenance and is subject to the same high level of scrutiny and control as the Airline’s programme. In addition to flight training, AAPA students receive an exposure to airworthiness processes at the Rex maintenance facility which assists them in better understanding the relationship of aircraft maintenance to their flying duties. |
| A vibrant city | |
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Lastly Wagga Wagga, being the largest inland city in the State of New South Wales and a vibrant "Garden City" with its excellent sports, recreation, entertainment and amenities facilities, provides an ideal home away from home to the students during the many months of residential training with AAPA. The city centre is only 10 minutes drive from the campus.
For more information on Wagga Wagga, visit the Wagga Wagga City Council website at http://www.wagga.nsw.gov.au |