First woman fighter pilot to fly Hawk jet

Flight Lieutenant Mohana Singh has become the first woman fighter pilot to fly by day a Hawk advanced jet aircraft, a defence release has said.

She achieved the feat at the Kalaikunda Air Force Station in Bengal on Thursday, it said. “Flight Lieutenant Mohana Singh became the first woman fighter pilot to become fully operational by day on Hawk advanced jet aircraft as she landed after a gruelling 4 aircraft combat sortie at Air Force station Kalaikunda, West Bengal, which was the last syllabus sortie...,” the release issued on Friday said.

Her training involved flying both air-to-air combat and air-to-ground missions, it added. Singh has over 500 hours of incident-free flying, of which 380 hours are on the Hawk Mk 132 jet. PTI