Proflight celebrates Amelia Earhart

From Zambia Daily Mail:  Proflight celebrates Amelia Earhart

Proflight Zambia’s all female crew. From left, Captain Melinda Taylor, cabin attendant Ashley Muma and first officer, Catherine Willis.

PROFLIGHT Zambia celebrated the anniversary of the pioneering female aviator Amelia Earhart last Tuesday by appreciating the success of its own female crew with an all-woman crewed flight to Mfuwe.
Proflight Zambia commercial director Keira Irwin confirmed that the company witnessed the first flight crewed by an all-woman team with Captain Melinda Taylor at the controls, along with first officer Catherine Willis and cabin attendant Ashely Muma.
“The flight PO802 from Lusaka to Mfuwe was particularly significant coming close to (the) July 24 anniversary of the birth of Amelia Earhart, who in 1932 became the first woman pilot to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean, for which she received the US Distinguished Flying Cross,” Ms Irwin said.
Ms Irwin said Earhart is a role model for women aviators and all women the world over.
“Proflight thought it was only fitting to honour this amazing woman and we are proud to be continuing in her flight path with our team of dedicated and professional female crew members and their male colleagues. We hope this will inspire more women to follow a career in aviation,” she said.
Ms Irwin said Capt Taylor, who flew the plane from Lusaka to Mfuwe, has been flying with Proflight for more than two years.
She started flying with the Beechcraft Baron, which carries five passengers, and is now a Captain on the Jetstream 32, having completed simulator training earlier this year in the Netherlands.
 Capt Taylor is also a member of the Australian Women`s Pilot  Association and Women’s in Aviation International.
Whereas Ms Willis joined Proflight in June 2011 and is now a first officer on the Jetstream 32, having started on Jetstream 31.
Ms Muma is a cabin attendant on the Jetstream 32 aircraft and has been flying with Proflight since February 2011, and is one of the airline’s 12 and three male cabin crew.
“Proflight`s female staff follow in the footsteps of Earhart, who as well as crossing the Atlantic, set many other records; wrote best-selling books about her flying experiences and was instrumental in the formation of the Ninety-Nines, an organisation for female pilots,” she said.
Pioneer aviator Earhart was born in the United States on July 24 1897 and disappeared in 1937 during an attempt to make a circumnavigation flight on the globe.