Hungarians joined Croatian-Czech air advisory teams’ training

It is a joint training of Croatian and Czech helicopter crews and aircraft maintenance technicians, as part of pre-deployment training and preparation for deployment to ISAF operation in Afghanistan. The Air Advisory Team will train helicopter squadrons of the Afghan Air Force (AAF) at KAIA Kabul airport using NATO standards and procedures.

The introductory part of the course was undertaken on flight simulators in Ostrava in the Czech Republic, while the advanced flight training for a period of two weeks was conducted on the Mi-171 Sh helicopters in Zemunik. The Helicopter Squadron of the 93^rd Air Force Base with Bell-206 B helicopters provided training support.

Croatian and Czech teams with advisory support of the U.S. institutions and forces jointly designed the course. As such it was accepted and included within NATO “Smart Defence” Initiative and has raised the interest of other NATO and partner countries. Hungarian Air Force has sent its representative to this course as a prelude to further the cooperation and participation in the Croatian-Czech project of pilot training.

Commander of this course was a Croatian pilot Colonel Michael Križanec, who from his mentoring experience from Afghanistan in particular stressed the importance of coordination and standard procedures during the flight mission, all in order to achieve the highest standards of safety and effectiveness of the training mission in Afghanistan.