“We’ve made great strides in terms of piloting for the disabled, so don’t let your disability stand in your way.”
As part of its “Coup de Pouce” initiative (“Helping Hand”), the BNP Paribas Foundation is sponsoring the Mission Bleu Ciel Association (Blue Sky Mission).
The association brings hope to disabled people who have a passionate desire to fly. It provides pilot training programmes on planes that have been specially adapted for disabled people, leads awareness campaigns aimed at explaining the specific regulations on disability to flying clubs, and helps certain pilots to develop a professional career.
Guillaume Feral, Chairman of Mission Bleu Ciel and a trader at BNP Paribas, was recently asked to present the goals of the association at an interview on French Radio RCF. His main wish: to make disabled people aware of the possibilities that exist for them to fly, and to promote this initiative at various flying clubs around France.
“The first [objective] is to ensure that disabled people are made aware of the possibility of becoming pilots, either privately or professionally, and of obtaining support from flying clubs that would really like to welcome disabled people. They are given logistical support, information on how to go about it, about which machines can be fitted with manual controls adapted to their disability and what the constraints are when disabled people are received – constraints in terms of premises, of course, but also as regards compliance with certain regulations.”
IDE: to create income opportunities for poor rural households
Project Why: to create a model of education for for children in India
