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Anisa Amalia Octavia: The first female Indonesian pilot of the mighty Hercules
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Sky rider: Anisa Amalia Octavia poses in front of a Hercules aircraft. (JP/Nedi Putra AW)
I
ndonesia has only a few female pilots and Second Lieutenant Anisa Amalia Octavia, 25, is one of them. She has become the country’s first co-pilot of a Hercules aircraft under Squadron 32 of the Abdulrachman Saleh Air Base in Malang, East Java.
A specific set of skills are required of Anisa because, if anything happens to the pilot, a co-pilot should be able to take over.
“The biggest challenge here is endurance,” said Anisa, who was born in Sleman, Yogyakarta, on Oct. 13, 1994.
Anisa said there was a lack of vacation time in Squadron 32 as she had the regime of a professional soldier, needing to maintain good health and physical condition at all times.
Endurance is her main priority because, in handling the controls of an aircraft, an aviator must not be sleepy so as to utilize their flying time as effectively as possible. Physical strength is also needed for large aircraft with four engines like the Hercules.
“When I first trained with a Hercules, I felt sore all over the body,” she recalled.
