Australia’s largest provider of transport and logistics, Toll Group, has announced a deal with one of the world’s leading helicopter companies, Finmeccanica – AgustaWestland, to build and operate Australia’s first AgustaWestland-authorized training center.

In December Toll announced it had secured a 10-year aeromedical contract with the NSW Health to service the southern half of NSW and the ACT. The work involves buying eight purpose-built AW139 helicopters, as well as Toll building and operating an aeromedical training center of excellence at Bankstown Airport in southwest Sydney, a first for Australia.

The center will include a $15 million CAE 3000 Series AW139 Level D Full-Flight Motion Simulator, the most advanced civil helicopter simulator available and one of only eight in the world.

Announcing the news at the Australian International Airshow today, Toll Resources & Government Logistics CEO David Jackson said the simulator will be the jewel in the crown of the new training center.

“This massive investment by Toll and NSW Health will redefine best practice in pilot training and safety,” Mr Jackson said.

“The simulator will train all Toll pilots working on the NSW Health aeromedical contract and other AW139 operators in New South Wales, Queensland and Victoria, and it will have capacity to support any new government agency and private operator AW139 operations that commence in the coming years in the Australasia region.”

Mr Jackson said the technology used will also be able to be upgraded to support future AgustaWestland models such as the AW169 and AW189.

“Being an authorized AgustaWestland training centre means Toll staff working for NSW Ambulance will be trained to international standards utilizing the latest training programs, techniques and technology.”

“Currently, the closest authorized AgustaWestland simulator is located in Malaysia so new pilots-in-training have limited opportunity to gain the approximately 80 hours of training required.

“Having this authorized training center in Australia will allow us to deliver world’s best training to our people, so they can deliver the world’s best helicopter emergency retrieval service for NSW Ambulance.”

The state-of-the-art center will also include an advanced underwater escape training complex and wet and dry winching practice towers, and is expected to be operating mid-to-late 2016.

More than 100 highly-skilled operational and engineering roles will be created in the lead-up to operations on the NSW Health contract starting in January 2017. Interested applicants and suppliers can contact tollnswhelicopters@tollgroup.com for more details.