Khunou overcomes fear of flying by becoming pilot

When Kgothatso Khunou saw an advert looking for people to train as pilots, she applied even though she had a job as a biotechnologist.

She had hoped being a pilot would cure her fear of flying. 

Before taking on the scholarship, she could never imagine herself inside an aircraft because her fear always made her think that it would crash with her sitting inside.

Today, however, the fear is completely gone. She dumped her biotechnologist lab coat for a pilot's uniform, working for SAPS.

On Saturday, the mother of one was named the overall winner in the aviation category at the Forty/ Under-40 Awards.

The awards are held to honour and celebrate young achievers under the age of 40 from various industries. 

"I am still overwhelmed, it is a phase of my life that I still don't know how I got here, I am very grateful for the opportunity and for the consideration to be nominated.

"I am in love with what I do, I am in love with where I am – a lot of people complain about 'I don't want to get up and go to work', [but] I love flying, I love being at work," she said.

Apart from chasing criminals from up above, she also participates in rescue missions, like a group of hikers who were trapped in the mountains.

"I [becoming a pilot] did it to overcome the fear [for flying]. I was advised when I was doing my psychometric tests that when you get into an aircraft and you are in control, you somehow lose that fear, and it happened with me. The moment I could be in an aircraft the fear went. It was gone, just like that. I have said before that aviation chose me. It is a career that I grew to love completely," she told Sowetan on Monday.  

Born in Photsaneng, outside Rustenburg in North West, 39-years ago, Khunou studied biotechnology after matric.

One day, during her break at work, she bumped into an advert on Facebook,  for a scholarship to train as a pilot.

She applied and quit her job after getting the scholarship.

"It was a very big opportunity and I couldn’t just let it pass me. It was also to challenge myself and change the narrative that women are not able to do certain jobs," she said.

She joined the SAPS in 2014 after qualifying as a pilot. 

Now answering to Lit-Col Khunou, she is one of 17 female SAPS pilots nationwide. Her daily duties include attending to operations by providing air support to ground units searching for suspects.

One day she had to rescue a colleague who had been shot while responding to a crime in Tembisa.

The officer had been shot through the jaw and an ambulance could not reach him. On the other hand, the weather was not conducive for flying but Khunou insisted on flying to rescue the injured officer.

To do that, Khunou managed to convince the air traffic controllers that there was another route that she could use to get to Tembisa, despite the unfavourable conditions.

"I remember that day when we had to leave Rand airport [in Germiston]. There was a direct route from there to Tembisa but this time we had to go through town just to avoid bad weather. We got to Tembisa, loaded the man, and took him to hospital.

"We risked it all, we were not going to let the [officer] die. We landed where we could land, where it was safe to do, with children going to school. It was peak time in the morning. We called the hospital on the radio as well and asked that they be ready. To this day, I haven't met that man but I am happy that he survived. This is what we do daily," she said.

One thing about this job, Khunou said, is that the eyesight must be good. She undergoes regular eye tests to ensure she retains the ideal eyesight for the job.

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