United Airlines Supersizes the Largest Pilot Training Center in the World, Operating 46 Flight Simulators 24 Hours

United Airlines is making the largest pilot training center in the world even bigger with the addition of a new 150,000-square-foot building, which is capable of holding 12 brand-new advanced full-motion flight simulators.

The new facility at United’s Flight Training Center in Denver will be able to train up to 240 pilots every single day, operating 24 hours a day and nearly all year long.

The Flight Training Center comprises a total of eight buildings with more than 700,000 square feet of training space and 46 state-of-the-art full-motion flight simulators currently in use.

So far, six new simulators have been installed in the new building, but United has space for an additional six simulators, allowing it to grow its capacity to 52 simulators.

When all the facilities are combined, United’s Flight Training Center is capable of training 860 pilots a day. The airline estimates that the center can run around 32,000 ‘training events’ annually, with the facilities closed for just three days per year.

Spread across an expansive 32-acre campus, the training center hosts new hire pilots, as well as all of United’s experienced pilots who have to complete intensive simulator training every nine months.

Originally opened in 1966, the training center has grown significantly over the decades, with the latest expansion setting United back a cool $145 million.

Last year, United opened a new flight attendant center in Houston, which is capable of training as many as 600 flight attendants per month.

The centrepiece of the 56,000 sq. ft. facility is a 125,000-gallon pool that has a mock aircraft fuselage so that flight attendants can train for the very worst-case scenario of an evacuation onto the water.

Along with the state-of-the-art aquatic center, United has also installed additional cabin mockups so that flight attendants can train in realistic-looking environments. The mockups feature sounds, lights and smoke to mimic the kind of emergencies that flight attendants might have to deal with in real life.