RWANDAIR PROMOTES FIRST RWANDAN PILOT TO B737 CAPTAIN
(Posted 17th December 2013)
Rwanda’s national airline RwandAir yesterday announced the promotion of First Officer Bosco Murabukirwa to the rank of Captain, the first time a Rwandan national has made it to the left seat in the cockpit. This development is part of a sustained effort to bring more Rwandan nationals ‘on board’ as pilots and aircraft technicians, aimed to reduce the need for the recruitment of foreign pilots and to address the growing pilot shortage which has handed airline human resource planners a huge challenge for the coming years. RwandAir employs another 12 Rwandan pilots, all of them currently serving as First Officers to gain experience and accumulate the necessary hours on an aircraft type before meeting the requirements by the Rwanda Civil Aviation Authority and by RwandAir to be eligible for promotion. Captain Bosco completed his ‘check out flight’ under the supervision of RwandAir’s Director of Flight Operations Capt. Santos Pio who on arrival of the B737 in Kigali then handed Bosco Murabukirwa his ‘promotion’ in the form of his new four striped pips. while airline CEO John Mirenge provided then new jacket with the four stripes on the sleeves, witnessed by and much applauded by the staff of RwandAir who had rushed to the aircraft to witness this momentous achievement.
Captain Bosco will now be able to fly RwandAir’s B737-800NG and their B737-700NG aircraft, of which the airline has two each in service.
RwandAir, one of the fastest growing airlines in the wider Eastern and Central African region, also flies two recently acquired Bombardier CRJ900NextGen and will replace a wetleased single class Bombardier Dash 8-100 with a state of the art Bombardier Q400 dual class aircraft, due for delivery in February 2014.
Seen below are Capt. Santos Pio, Director of Flight Operations, RwandAir’s Chief Pilot Capt. Marcel Gabou Tirefort, RwandAir’s CEO John Mirenge and the newly promoted Capt. Bosco Murabukirwa.
Happy Landings, always.
