Flyadeal, a budget subsidiary of flag carrier Saudia, has become the first ever airline in the history of Saudi Arabian aviation to fly with an all-women crew handling flight operations.
“For the first time in Saudi aviation history! Flyadeal operated the first flight with all-female crew, majority of which are Saudis by the newest A320 aircraft,” tweeted the airline.
Most of the seven crew members were Saudi women including the co-pilot named Yara Jan, who is also one of the youngest Saudi women pilots. However, the captain of the flight was not a Saudi woman, according to what a spokesperson of the airline shared with the media.
The flight took off from Saudi’s capital city, Riyadh, to Jeddah on 19 May.
Saudi Arabia’s aviation authority, which also confirmed this news from Flyadeal, is working constantly towards creating more opportunities for women in the aviation sector of the country. In fact, as a country, Saudi Arabia has managed to increase the participation of women in the workforce in the past six years. As per a data by General Authority of Statistics, the participation of women in the workforce stood at 33 per cent in 2020, having gone up from 19 per cent in 2016.
In 2019, Saudi Arabia saw its first woman co-pilot flying her first flight. The participation of women in the workforce of the country has significantly improved under the Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s Vision 2030 economic diversification plan.
