Gregory Polek has spent his entire career in aviation journalism with AIN, starting as a proofreader and assistant to then-managing editor Mary Mahoney in 1995 after serving an internship with&nbsp;New Jersey Monthly&nbsp;magazine and completing his B.A. degree in English/Writing at New Jersey’s William Paterson College. By 1997 Polek accepted a position as an associate editor, covering the regional airline beat for&nbsp;Aviation International News&nbsp;in place of retiring industry veteran Don Anderson. The assignment took Polek across North America and Europe to profile regional airlines varying in size and mission from the likes of floatplane operators Kenmore Air and Chalk’s Ocean Airways to regional jet operators such as SkyWest and American Eagle. Today, in his dual role as Air Transport Editor and International Airshow Editor, Polek writes, edits, and manages AIN’s commercial aviation content while overseeing each of the company’s daily international air show publications in Paris, Farnborough, Singapore, and Dubai. Most recently Polek has assumed oversight of daily coverage of the Helicopter Association International’s annual Heli-Expo convention.

Senior Editor

Gregory Polek

Airbus has acquired the Strategic Simulation Solutions flight training center in Aurora, Colorado, marking the opening of its first such facility in the western U.S., the manufacturer announced Thursday. The center&nbsp;primarily supports Frontier Airlines and carries what Airbus calls significant room for growth.&nbsp;The company said it plans to at least double capacity at the facility in the next few years.&nbsp; &nbsp;

 


“This is another major step forward in our ambition to grow services around the world,” said Airbus head of services Laurent Martinez. “Our global services forecast predicts a need for 122,000 new pilots in the Americas by 2035, representing 23 percent of the world’s demand. We want our Airbus flight training facilities to be easily accessible to our customers regardless of their location, hence this latest move.”

 


Before the acquisition Airbus provided training to the North American market primarily from its Miami, Florida-based training center. Over the past two years Airbus has expanded its training capacity for customers in the Americas with the addition of training centers in Mexico City and in Campinas, Brazil. Globally, Airbus expanded its training network more than threefold in the past three years, growing from five locations in 2015 to 17 locations today.&nbsp;

 


“We will hold steady in our ambition to provide the most state-of-the-art, top-quality training to our customers, and to continue expanding our global training capacity at its current pace,” Martinez said. &nbsp;

 


The Aurora training center now features two A320 family level-D full-flight simulators for training Frontier Airlines pilots on the airline’s all-Airbus fleet. Airbus plans to add more simulators at the Denver facility this year to address anticipated increased demand for training.&nbsp;

News about simulators and training procedures, as well as workforce.

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News and issues about aviation maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO), covering all segments of the aviation industry; and modifications for aircraft and engines. Subjects include product support of aircraft, engines and avionics, MRO company mergers, acquisitions, announcements and personnel, Airworthiness Directives, Supplemental Type Certificate approvals and other topics.

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News and issues relating to the aerospace industry that are related to the science, engineering and business of flight in space involving civil, industrial and military applications, and similar topics related to flight in the atmosphere of the Earth that are not covered more directly by other AINonline subject channels. In other words, both astronautical and aeronautical subjects, except for those aeronautical topics that are specifically covered elsewhere on this website.

More In Training and Workforce

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