Press Release

Lufthansa Aviation Training (LAT) gave the go-ahead at the beginning of the year for the expansion of the training site of Lufthansa Aviation Training Austria in Vienna, involving investments in the double-digit million euro range. The simulator center in operation since 2006 is home to four full flight simulators (FFS) and two flat panel trainers (FPT) at present. The facility has attracted a large clientele in the field of pilot training due to the extensive demand for pilots. The cockpit crews of more than 20 airlines regularly undergo training in Vienna.

Ola Hansson (Managing Director of Lufthansa Aviation Training GmbH), Christian Korherr (Managing Director of Lufthansa Aviation Training Austria), Alexis von Hoensbroech (CEO of Austrian Airlines) and Julian Jäger (Member of the Management Board of Flughafen Wien AG) took part in the symbolic groundbreaking. It was held on Thursday, May 23, 2019 on the eastern side of the Lufthansa Aviation Training Austria building in Vienna.

Ongoing training operations during the construction phase will continue as scheduled. After completion in the first quarter of the year 2020, the planned expansion will offer sufficient space for up to three additional full flight simulators and two flight training devices (FTD) including the accompanying briefing rooms. Initially two new Airbus A320 simulators will complement the training fleet in Vienna. After the building extension has been put into operation, the new simulators will help enable the facility to offer a total of 36,000 full flight simulator hours. This roughly corresponds to all officially relevant recurrent trainings of 360 short- and medium-haul aircraft (e.g. the Airbus A320) annually.

At the same time, all Austrian Airlines trainings on the aircraft types Airbus A320, Bombardier DHC-8 and Embraer EMB190 can be carried out in Vienna in the future, to give one example. In this way, the airline reduces travel costs and the crews save time because they will not have to undergo training in other locations. Eurowings Europe and Laudamotion based in Vienna will also benefit from the expanding training capacities at the LAT facility, thus enhancing its attractiveness for other airlines.

“Making further investments on this scale only twelve years after the opening of the simulator center in Vienna fills us with pride and joy. Our objective is to be able to continue offering a modern training environment to our airline customers in the future featuring even higher simulator capacities and the latest devices alongside our customized training solutions”, states Christian Korherr, Managing Director of Lufthansa Aviation Training Austria.

"The Federal Ministry of Transport, Innovation and Technology welcomes today's ground-breaking ceremony for the extension of the pilot training centre in Vienna. This is positive from three points of view: Well-trained pilots strengthen the high safety standards, they help to create capacities and thus avoid bottlenecks, and the training in Vienna also strengthens Austria as an aviation location," says Elisabeth Landrichter, Head of the Aviation Department at the Federal Ministry of Transport, Innovation and Technology.

Julian Jäger, Joint CEO and COO of Vienna Airport: “The expansion of the pilot training center strengthens the role of Vienna Airport as a competence hub for the Lufthansa Group and many other airlines. We consider this project to be an upgrading of the airport as an international training location and are delighted with this decision on the part of Lufthansa.”

“The timing of the investments is just right”, explains Austrian Airlines CEO Alexis von Hoensbroech. “We will expand our Airbus fleet from 36 to 46 aircraft over the next two years in exchange for our turboprop fleet and will require about 120 new pilots.”