Gao Song a woman born after 1990, is the first woman firefighting helicopter (直升机) pilot in China. She has flown more than 500 hours. Gao is a member of the fire rescue (救援) team in Qingdao east China's Shandong Province. She was careful and calm. "My grandfather once served in the air force. Influenced by him, I always thought being a pilot was a cool job and it's also a dream for me. " Gao said.
After several rounds of competition, Gao was finally sent to the Civil Aviation Flight University of China because of hard training. She had only half a year to finish all 13 courses. To pass the courses and training, she slept after 2 a. m. almost every day during that time.
Gao has taken part in number of firefighting tasks. In April 2020. Gao and her teammates performed takeoff 34 times in four days, with over 85 hours in the air, dropping more than 1,000 tons of water exactly over the fire and finally brought the fire under control.
Gao is one of seven helicopter pilots of the Qingdao fire rescue detachment (分队). She is able to drive four types of planes: the HU-269, AS-350, AWI 19 and Ka-32. She said she hopes to become the captain of a Ka-32 as soon as possible. "I'll keep flying as long as I can," said Gao.
