Yvonne Pope Sintes

Yvonne Pope Sintes (born 1930) is a retired British aviator of South African origin. She was the first female air traffic controller at Gatwick airport and later became Britain's first female commercial airline captain.

Life

Sintes was born Yvonne Elizabeth van den Hoek on 8 September 1930 in Pretoria, South Africa.[1]

She raised sons.[2]

Career

Sintes worked a career within aviation that spanned multiple professions: air stewardess,[3] member of the RAF Volunteer Reserve,[2] flight instructor, air traffic controller, and pilot.[4]

In 1953 Sintes was licensed as a private pilot and assistant instructor rating at Denham.[5] In 1955 she became a co-founder of the British Women Pilots’ Association.[6]

Sintes worked at Gatwick Airport from 1960 to 1964 as the first female air traffic controller.[4]

Morton Air Services recruited Sintes as a pilot in 1965.[7] Starting in 1972,[7] she was Britain's first commercial airline captain, which included crew responsibility.[8] Sintes flew as a pilot for UK-based airline Dan-Air from the early 1970s until her retirement in 1980.[9]

Awards

References
  1. "Trailblazer in Flight" (autobiography). 2013. Pen & Sword Aviation by Yvonne Pope Sintes with Graham M. Simons ISBN 978-1783462674
  2. Yvonne Pope Sintes, interview with Griffinity: results with people
  3. Yvonne Pope Sintes: Britain's first female airline pilot interview by Richard Westcott BBC 2013-12-30
  4. Yvonne Sintes, the first ever female air traffic controller visits NATS in Hampshire by Emma Streatfield Daily Echo 2014-08-14.
  5. BWPA honours Yvonne Sintes Flyer AirPortal 2014-08-04
  6. Celebrating 100 years of British women pilots 2013-07-17
  7. Female pilots: a slow take-off by Emine Saner The Guardian 2014-01-13
  8. Amelia Earhart: What is her legacy for female pilots? Stylist magazine, 2014
  9. Dan-Air Remembered by Dave Parsons
  10. BWPA honours Yvonne Sintes, first woman to captain a commercial jet airliner Pilot Career News 2014-08-04
  11. "The Woman Engineer Vol 8". www2.theiet.org. Retrieved 23 January 2021.

Further reading
  • "Trailblazer in Flight" (autobiography). 2013. Pen & Sword Aviation ISBN 978-1783462674

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