Eight years after starting as a flight attendant, a Malaysian woman is now flying Airbus jets. Suriati Sukardi, 36, joined AirAsia in 2017 and spent eight years in the cabin while hoping to move up. In 2019, the airline gave her a chance to learn to fly. She finished her pilot course in 2022.
There was no pilot job for her right away, so she returned to cabin duty and kept searching. Two years later, a pilot job finally opened up, and she began flying the A320 and A321. AirAsia's cadet pilot program began in 2004. It was paused for two years during the pandemic and started again in March 2023. In 2021, women made up 4 percent of pilots worldwide, compared with 3.6 percent in 2016. The figures come from the UN's civil aviation agency.