An aircraft pilot or aviator is a person
who actively and directly operates the
directional flight controls of an
aircraft while it is in flight. While
other members of a flight crew such as
flight engineer, navigator, or any other
person involved in the direct flight
operations of an aircraft, are also
considered "aviators", they are not
pilots and do not command a flight or
aircraft. Aircrew who are not involved
in operating the aircraft's flight
systems as well as ground crew are not
generally classified as aviators.
In recognition of the pilots'
qualifications and responsibilities,
most militaries and many airlines
worldwide award aviator badges to their
pilots, as well as other air crews. This
includes naval aviators.
History
The first recorded use of the term
aviator was in 1887, as a variation of
"aviation", from the Latin avis, coined
in 1863 by G. de la Landelle in Aviation
Ou Navigation Aérienne. The term
aviatrix, now archaic, was formerly used
for a female aviator. These terms were
used more in the early days of aviation,
when airplanes were extremely rare, and
connoted bravery and adventure. For
example, a 1905 reference work described
the Wright brothers' first airplane:
"The weight, including the body of the
aviator, is a little more than 700
pounds".
To ensure the safety of people in the
air and on the ground, early aviation
soon required that aircraft be under the
operational control of a properly
trained, certified pilot at all times,
who is responsible for the safe and
legal completion of the flight. The
Aéro-Club de France delivered the first
certificate to Louis Blériot in
1908—followed by Glenn Curtiss, Léon
Delagrange, and Robert Esnault-Pelterie.
The absolute authority given to the
"pilot in command" derives from that of
a ship's captain.
Civilian
Civilian pilots fly aircraft of all
types privately for pleasure, charity,
or in pursuance of a business, and/or
commercially for non-scheduled and
scheduled passenger and cargo air
carriers, corporate aviation,
agriculture, forest fire control, law
enforcement, etc. When flying for an
airline, pilots are usually referred to
as airline pilots, with the pilot in
command often referred to as the
captain.
= United States=
In 1930, the Air Commerce Act
established pilot licensing requirements
for American civil aviation.
Commercial airline pilots in the United
States have a mandatory retirement age
of 65, having increased from age 60 in
2007.
= Canada=
Pilots licensing in Canada is similar to
the United States.
The Aeronautics Act of 1985 and Canadian
Aviation Regulations provide rules for
pilots in Canada.
Retirement age is provided by each
airline with some set to age 60, but
changes to the Canadian Human Rights Act
have restricted retirement age set by
the airlines.
= Outside North America=
In some countries, such as
Pakistan,Thailand and several African
nations, there is a strong relationship
between the military and the principal
national airlines, and many airline
pilots come from the military; however,
that is no longer the case in the United
States and Western Europe. While the
flight decks of U.S. and European
airliners do have ex-military pilots,
many pilots are civilians. Military
training and flying, while rigorous, is
fundamentally different in many ways
from civilian piloting.
Military
Military pilots fly with the armed
forces of a government or nation-state.
Their tasks involve combat and
non-combat operations, including direct
hostile engagements and support
operations. Military pilots undergo
specialized training, often with
weapons. Examples of military pilots
include fighter pilots, bomber pilots,
transport pilots, test pilots and
astronauts. Military pilots also serve
as flight crews on aircraft for
government personnel, such as Air Force
One and Air Force Two in the United
States.
Military pilots are trained with a
different syllabus than civilian pilots,
which is delivered by military
instructors. This is due to the
different aircraft, flight goals, flight
situations and chains of responsibility.
Many military pilots do transfer to
civilian-pilot qualification after they
leave the military, and typically their
military experience provides the basis
for a civilian pilot's license.
Unmanned aerial vehicles
Unmanned aerial vehicles operate without
a pilot on-board and are classed into
two categories: autonomous aircraft that
operate without active human control
during flight and remotely piloted UAVs
which are operated remotely by one or
more persons. The person controlling a
remotely piloted UAV may be referred to
as its pilot or operator. Depending on
the sophistication and use of the UAV,
pilots/operators of UAVs may require
certification or training, but are
generally not subject to the
licensing/certification requirements of
pilots of manned aircraft.
Most jurisdictions have restrictions on
the use of UAVs which have greatly
limited their use in controlled
airspace; UAVs have mostly been limited
to military and hobbyist use. In the
United States, use of UAVs is very
limited in controlled airspace and the
FAA prohibits nearly all commercial use.
Once regulations are made to allow
expanded use of UAVs in controlled
airspace, there is expected to be a
large surge of UAVs in use and,
consequently, high demand for
pilots/operators of these aircraft.
Space
The general concept of an airplane pilot
can be applied to human spaceflight, as
well. The spacecraft pilot is the
astronaut who directly controls the
operation of a spacecraft, while located
within that same craft. This term
derives directly from the usage of the
word "pilot" in aviation, where it is
synonymous with "aviator". Note that on
the U.S. Space Shuttle, the term "pilot"
is analogous to the term "co-pilot" in
aviation, as the "commander" has
ultimate responsibility for the shuttle.
Pilot certifications
Pilots are required to go through many
hours of flight training and theoretical
study, that differ depending on the
country. The first step is acquiring the
Private Pilot License, or Private Pilot
Certificate. This takes at least 40
hours of flight time with a Certified
Flight Instructor.
The next step in a pilot's progression
is either Instrument Rating, or
Multi-Engine Rating endorsements.
If a professional career or
professional-level skills are desired, a
Commercial Pilot License endorsement
would also be required. To captain an
airliner, one must obtain an Airline
Transport Pilot License. Now, even when
being a First Officer, an ATP is
required. 
Some countries/carriers require/use a
Multi Crew Coordination.
Female aviators
= Pioneers=
Pioneer women aviators include French,
Raymonde de Laroche, the world's first
licensed female pilot on March 8, 1910;
Belgian, Hélène Dutrieu, the first woman
to fly a passenger, first woman to win
an air race, and first woman to pilot a
seaplane; French, Marie Marvingt the
first woman to fly solo across the
English Channel and the North Sea in a
balloon and first woman to fly as a
bomber pilot in combat missions; New
Zealander Jean Batten was the first
person to fly from England to New
Zealand, Russian, Eugenie Shakhovskaya
was the first female military pilot;
American, Harriet Quimby, the USA's
first licensed female pilot in 1911, and
the first woman to cross the English
Channel by airplane; American Amelia
Earhart, the first woman to fly solo
across the Atlantic; Bessie Coleman, the
first African American female to become
a licensed airplane pilot; German, Marga
von Etzdorf, first woman to fly for an
airline.
Opal Kunz, one of the few women to train
US Navy fighter pilots during World War
II in the Civilian Pilot Training
Program; Edith Maud Cook, who made
numerous parachute jumps from balloons,
learned to fly in France and was
possibly the first British woman to do
so. Hilda Hewlett opened a flying school
with her aviator husband and was the
first woman to gain a RAeC certificate.
Amy Johnson, the first woman to fly solo
from Britain to Australia. Valérie
André, a French neurosurgeon and member
of the French army, became the first
woman to fly a helicopter in combat,
while serving in Indochina. Jean Batten,
a New Zealander, made a number of
record-breaking solo flights across the
world, including, in 1936, the
first-ever solo flight from England to
New Zealand.
Katherine Cheung was a notable
Asian-American female pilot in the
1930s.
As well as being Turkey's first female
pilot, Sabiha Gökçen, born in 1913,
became the world's first female fighter
pilot at the age of 23.
In 1979, a Jamaican, Maria
Ziadie-Haddad, became one of the first
women in the Western Hemisphere to
become a commercial jet airline pilot
when she was hired by Air Jamaica as a
Boeing 727 second officer.
Barbara Harmer was the first qualified
female Concorde pilot in 1993.
Louise Sacchi was the first
international woman ferry pilot who flew
planes across the Atlantic and Pacific
oceans over 340 times, more than any
other non-airline pilot. In 1971 she set
a speed record by flying a single-engine
land plane from New York to London in 17
hours and 10 minutes, a record that
still stands today. Sacchi was the first
woman to win the Godfrey L. Cabot Award
for distinguished service to aviation.
= Soviet Union=
The Night Witches, a women-only combat
regiment of the Soviet Air Forces, flew
harassment bombing and precision bombing
missions from 1942 to the end of the
World War II.
= Pakistan=
Ms Shukrya Khanum became a pioneer by
receiving her Commercial Licence in 60s
closely followed by Ms Maliha Sami and
Ms Aysha, they were both inducted by PIA
as commercial flyers. Capt Natasha Sami
who is the fourth female pilot in the
history of Pakistan, then moved on to
become the first female to have received
the Airline Transport Pilot's Licence in
the country's history. Pakistani pilot
Ayesha Farooq was the first female
fighter pilot for the Pakistani
airforce. At least 19 women became
pilots in the air force in the decade
from 2003.
= Canada=
First licensed pilot in Canada was
Eileen Vollick in 1928.
Molly Reilly was the first Canadian
woman to become a civilian pilot and
Rosella Bjornson was the first
commercial airline pilot.
In 1989 Deanne Brasseur and Jane Foster
are the first women to fly military
aircraft in Canada.
= China=
China has trained more than 500 female
pilots since 1951. Large numbers have
been trained to fly China's most
advanced combat jets, including the
J-10.
= United States=
Until the 1970s, aviation had been a
traditionally male occupation in the
United States. Commerce Department
regulations virtually required pilots to
have flown in the military to acquire
sufficient flight hours, and until the
1970s, the U.S. Air Force and Navy
barred women from flying, thus also
preventing them from moving into
commercial piloting. Despite women being
trained by the U.S. Army Air Forces and
flying every advanced military aircraft
the U.S. built during World War II as
Women Airforce Service Pilots, this
program was disbanded in December 1944.
At that time, commercial jobs were not
generally available to women, though
these highly trained women flew as
instructors and pilots for flying
services throughout the United States.
Women eventually began to enter U.S.
major commercial aviation in the 1970s
and 1980s, with 1973 seeing the first
female pilot at a major U.S. airline,
American Airlines, and 1986 seeing the
first female captain at a major U.S.
airline. In the 1970s, women were again,
for the first time since WWII, permitted
to fly in the United States Armed
Forces, beginning with the Navy and the
Army in 1974, and then the Air Force in
1976.
As of 2010, just over 7% of certified
civilian pilots in the United States
were women. As of July 2014,
approximately 5.12% of certified airline
or commercial pilots in the United
States are women.
= India=
Sarla Thakral was first Indian woman to
fly. Born in 1914, she earned an
aviation pilot license in 1936 at the
age of 21 and flew a Gypsy Moth solo.
She had a four-year-old daughter. After
obtaining the initial licence, she
persevered on and completed one thousand
hours of flying in the aircraft owned by
the Lahore Flying Club. Her husband P.
D. Sharma whom she married at 16 and
comes from a family which had 9 pilots
encouraged her to achieve it. . 
Flight Lt. Harita Kaur Deol was a pilot
with the Indian Air Force. She was the
first woman pilot to fly solo in the
Indian Air Force. The flight was on 2
September 1994 in an Avro HS-748, when
she was 22 years old.
Nivedita Bhasin of Indian Airlines
became the youngest woman pilot in world
civil aviation history to command a
commercial jet aircraft on 1 January
1990 at the age of 26. Capt Nivedita
Bhasin piloted IC-492 on the
Bombay-Aurangabad-Udaipur sector.
= Japan=
In Japan, the first female captain for
commercial passenger flights was Ari
Fuji, who began flying as captain for
JAL Express in July 2010. Fuji was
rejected from admission to Japanese
pilot training school on the grounds of
being too small; standard was previously
163 cm, currently 158 cm as of spring
2010), so she got her pilot's license in
the United States. There are currently a
few other female pilots in Japan,
though, as of 2010, no others in a
captain role.
= Saudi Arabia=
Hanadi Zakaria al-Hindi is the first
Saudi woman to become a commercial
airline pilot.
See also
Aircrew
Airline pilot uniforms
Air safety
IMSAFE
List of aerospace engineers
List of aviators
List of Russian aviators
Women of Aviation Worldwide Week, an
international celebration of all women
of aviation
References
External links
Media related to Aviators at Wikimedia
Commons
U.S. Women Pilots Statistics 1960–2010
