Sky rider: Anisa Amalia Octavia poses in front of a Hercules aircraft.

A specific set of skills are required of Anisa because, if anything happens to the pilot, the copilot 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.

Anisa is aware that Squadron 32 transports heavy loads when it operates the Hercules C-130 aircraft and other Hercules variations, such as type B cargo and tanker aircraft and a type H aircraft that used to belong to the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF).

“It’s a high-intensity transportation squadron and we’ve often had emergency missions. Hercules planes have to be always ready when there are misfortunes, incidents, natural disasters or other social assignments,” she said.

With about 60 flight hours under her belt, the pilot has executed several missions including carrying a jamboree group from Jakarta to Manokwari, Papua.

“The flight to Papua wasn’t a direct one because the aircraft’s condition necessitates stopovers at several transit points for refueling, although the distance could be covered in a day,” she said. Each mission usually lasts for three or four days depending on the circumstances and superior’s orders.

She has not had the opportunity to carry out any natural disaster missions, including those in Palu after an earthquake hit years ago, because she was then attending ground school.

“But now I’m ready to receive orders any time,” she said.

As a consequence of her career choice, she has limited time to see her family in Yogyakarta. Therefore, Anisa was very emotional when she finally had the opportunity to see her mother while on a mission to Yogyakarta.

“Aboard the aircraft I didn’t turn to the pilot because I was tearful seeing my mother on the runway,” the oldest of three siblings said.

Anisa in fact rarely sees her family. The Taruna Nusantara senior high school graduate lived in a dormitory in 2012. Later, she became a student of the Indonesian Air Force Academy (AAU) and joined flight training until she was assigned to Squadron 32 at the Abdulrachman Saleh Air Base.

Her journey toward becoming a pilot is an unlikely one given her previous phobia of heights. Before she graduated from AAU in 2017, she had never traveled by plane. Her mother shared the same phobia and had warned Anisa against air travel when she was a child.

Anisa boarded a plane for the first time while training in parachuting in Bandung. As an AAU student, she had to jump from a height of 1,500 meters.

“Four seconds after jumping down from the plane, I felt like fainting, but after the parachute came out I felt comfortable,” she said.

Yet, she recalled how her first flight and first parachute training did little to eliminate her phobia. Anisa later underwent a psychological assessment over flying a plane with two crew members and an instructor. The first aircraft she flew was a TP-120 trainer.

“This phobia was finally gone. I’m not sure exactly when, but it must have vanished during my several flights,” she said, noting that the trainer aircraft even allowed her to become more courageous and fond of flying.

Anisa began flying a Hercules after she moved to Sqaudron 32. With the jumbo aircraft, she could feel a difference from the trainer plane, which has controls that are like joysticks, making it relatively easy to maneuver, and only one engine compared with the Hercules’ four.

“With the Hercules, I had to follow special training to move the power lever with one hand and handle controls for aircraft movement with the other, not to mention maneuver it,” she said.

Squadron 32 Commandant Lieut. Col. Suryo Anggoro said Anisa was the pride of his squadron.

“She is the icon of Squadron 32, the only woman out of 21 pilots here,” he said.

Suryo explained, however, that he would not treat Anisa as the favorite, but as one of the squadron members, especially as it was the task of Hercules pilots to stay professional — they have to work full time, transport disaster relief aid, evacuate disaster victims and, if necessary, carry dead bodies.

He acknowledged that Anisa might later lead a private life and have a family of her own, so he drew up a program for Anisa to enable her to further her career while dedicating time to her family.

If she is on leave for pregnancy, for instance, Anisa would be allowed to study theory and prepare for future Hercules missions before resuming flying.

“It’s not dispensation, but I try to be fair to suit her nature as a woman,” he said.

— Photos by JP/Nedi Putra AW

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