In a collaborative effort that involves aviation experts from Norway, Spain, Italy and England, a complete e-learning course for the initial training of professional helicopter pilots is under development with support from EU’s Leonardo da Vinci programme. Leonardo da Vinci is part of EU's new programme for lifelong learning (LLP) and supports vocational education and training. In 1996, prior to the introduction of the new syllabus for fixed wing aircraft, Nordian and partners received funding from the Leonardo da Vinci Programme to develop a standardised training solution to be used all over Europe, consisting of books, Computer Based Training (CBT) and study guides. The output of the project is now in use by flight training organisations in Norway, Sweden, Finland, Iceland, England, Germany, Holland, Belgium, Austria, Switzerland, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Turkey, Poland, Estonia, Serbia, The United Arab Emirates and India.

The aim and objectives of the new helicopter project is to offer an equivalent standardised training solution for the training of professional helicopter pilots in Europe by adapting the output of the previous project. The new project will make use of new technology by adapting an optional distance learning feature to enhance the dissemination and exploitation of the outcome. The existing 15 fixed wing text books will be modified and rewritten as required to comply with the latest syllabus. The existing CBT and study guides will be adapted to the helicopter syllabus and the training material will be made available from a distance learning platform with full learning management features. A large amount of new helicopter specific CBT will be developed as well.

There are 4 partner organisations which together form a strong entity with qualified and experienced human resources: Nordian is a well known developer of aviation training systems which traces it’s roots back to the government funded National Flight Academy of Norway, London Metropolitan University is one of the foremost providers of professional theoretical and synthetic pilot training in England, Top Fly is a well known high quality flight training organisation in Spain certified to ISO 9001 standard and is authorised as a Helicopter Pilot Training Centre, and finally AgustaWestland is apart from being a helicopter manufacturer also an established provider of professional training services and solutions to a wide range of military and civil customers around the world.

The results of this project will be a total training solution fully integrated into an E-learning platform, and will contain a learning management system and an online question bank as well as the textbooks and Computer Based Training. This allows training organisations the flexibility of either conducting their theoretical training as traditional classroom-based courses or Internet-based courses – or any combination of these two training methods (also known as blended learning).

The project is scheduled to be completed in late 2010, but a beta version will be available at an earlier stage.