Duke of Cambridge to work with East Anglian air ambulance
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Version 0 of 1. The Duke of Cambridge is to start work with the East Anglian air ambulance (EAAA) this summer after finishing and passing air transport pilot licence exams. William, a former RAF search and rescue helicopter pilot, sat 14 written exams that ranged from the principles of flight, navigation, flight planning to air law. The second-in-line to the throne will be employed by Bond Air Services, which runs a number of air ambulance and police aviation operations. William, 32, will join the company when he returns from his seven-day tour of Japan and China. He will undergo job-specific training before starting work. “After he returns from his tour to Japan and China in March, he will start working for East Anglian air ambulance and be formally employed by Bond Air Services,” said a Kensington palace spokesman. “He will initially be required to complete another period of mandatory training, involving aircraft training, in-flight skills testing and further written exams.” The full-time role, for which he will donate his salary to charity, will be fitted in around royal duties. The job based at Cambridge airport is convenient for the Cambridges’ new country home, Anmer Hall, a Grade II-listed 10-bedroom mansion on the Queen’s Sandringham estate, recently privately refurbished to accommodate the duke and duchess and Prince George. While in London, the couple will live at their 21-room apartment at Kensington Palace, recently refurbished at a cost of £4.5m to the public purse. The EAAA operates two helicopters and employs three pilots in Norwich and three in Cambridge, covering Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire and Bedfordshire. Along with a pilot, each helicopter carries a doctor and a paramedic. William’s main duties will involve flying an EC145 T2 aircraft, working alongside medics to respond to emergencies ranging from road accidents to heart attacks. The announcement came as William arrived in Japan for a four-day visit that will see him meet survivors of the 2011 tsunami. He started his first visit to Japan with the tea ceremony at Hama Rikyu Gardens in Tokyo. His wife Kate, who is due to give birth to their second child in April, stayed home. The Edo-era style garden, which once belonged to a feudal shogun, is filled with sculpted pine trees and blossoming plum trees, and features wooden bridges over several lakes. The Japan leg will include a visit to a school in the north-eastern region of Fukushima, where some areas have been closed off around a nuclear power plant that went into meltdown four years ago. William will also visit other areas devastated by the March 2011 tsunami to show support for the survivors and pay his respects to those who died. The tsunami and the quake that set it off killed about 19,000 people, and displaced tens of thousands, including those whose homes were intact but contaminated by the radiation spewed from the Fukushima plant. He will be taken to the area devastated by the waters, but some have claimed he will not meet families whose lives were blighted when the tsunami triggered the Fukushima nuclear disaster. Local leaders have accused Japan’s prime minister, Shinzo Abe, who wants to restart the country’s nuclear plants, of using the royal visit for his own aims. According to local reports Abe will join William on his visit to a public playground where contaminated soil has been removed – but it is believed he will not meet families driven from their homes by the nuclear disaster. In China, William is to visit Beijing’s Forbidden City and he will launch the three-day great festival of creativity in Shanghai. |