The first Spanish woman to obtain a pilot's license and the first flight instructor

Maria Josep Colomer was the daughter of Josep Colomer i Girbau, from Sabadell, an open and liberal textile manufacturer, a personal friend of Picasso, whom he admired, and Maria Encarnació Luque, a school teacher. It was precisely her father who arranged for his daughter to study at the Institut de Cultura y Biblioteca Popular de la Dona, who was also her ally when Mari Pepa decided to dedicate herself to the world of aviation

She obtained her pilot's license on January 19, 1931, aged 18, which led her to appear on the front page of the newspaper La Vanguardia on January 22, 1931. To make history and become the first female aviator, together with his father, he had to convince the rector Josep Canudas, who at the time was the most responsible for the Canudas aerodrome, of his determination and relentless desire to fly. After proving amply that flying was not a mere whim or an eccentricity, Pepa Colomer was accepted, as the first student, in the school's courses taking her mother's secret course. A few months later she obtained the title and this was only the beginning of her short but intense career as an aviator.

After obtaining the basic qualification, Mari Pepa signed up for a commercial pilot course of 50 hours of flight, starting to do a number of jobs that ranged from throwing propaganda on the beaches from the small plane, to carrying goods from from one place to another. At the same time, to gain professional experience and demonstrate that he was at the same level as the rest of the pilots, all men, he participated in several amateur pilot competitions, including, on August 30, 1931, the II Aviation Competition of Cardedeu, at that time very well known in the world of civil aviation. He even got to pilot and land a zeppelin at the Aeronaval airfield in 1932.

With the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, he became part of the Pilot School of the Generalitat de Catalunya, with the rank of first category assistant of the Aeronautic Service where he worked training new pilots for the Air Forces of the Republic spanish He made the first military flight on August 2, 1936, with the mission of dropping anti-fascist leaflets over Barcelona. On October 4, 1936, she was officially mobilized as a pilot, but without military graduation, as stated in the Official Gazette of the Generalitat. It also conducted coastal surveillance patrols in search of enemy ships and aircraft, and flew liaison and pay missions to the rear. Basically, he was responsible for taking wounded people from the Aragon front to Barcelona and transporting people threatened with death to the other side of the Pyrenees, making up to three trips a day at some points in the conflict.

At the end of the war, she went into exile with her aviation teacher and future husband, the pilot Josep Maria Carreras i Dexeus, first in Toulouse and finally in England. She never flew a plane again and when asked why, her answer was always that there was no work for her as a pilot in England.

In March 2003, the General Secretariat of Sport of the Generalitat of Catalonia paid him a tribute to his sporting career in the world of aviation. When he died, following his wishes, his ashes were taken to the Reus cemetery, where some relatives and friends with whom he had kept in touch during all the years he lived abroad lived.

Source: WIKIPEDIA