But the carrier suffered a blow when Flight 302, bound for Nairobi, Kenya, went down shortly after takeoff from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, killing all 157 people on board. An investigation is underway to determine why the plane, a Boeing 737 Max 8, crashed into a valley southeast of the airport just minutes after takeoff.

[Read our ongoing coverage of developments after Sunday’s crash.]

Since the crash, Ethiopian and more than a dozen other airlines around the world have grounded the model, in part because another accident involving a Max 8, owned by Lion Air, occurred in Indonesia in October, killing 189. The Federal Aviation Administration said that the inquiry of the latest crash had just begun and that it did not have enough information to take any action.

Ethiopian Airlines’ training academy, which 4,000 students pass through each year, trains not just pilots but also cabin crew, mechanics, and sales and management professionals. It draws those being groomed for jobs at Ethiopian and students from across Africa.

Nawal Taneja, an airline business strategist and a professor emeritus at Ohio State University’s Center for Aviation Studies, said on Monday that he was impressed by what the airline was doing with the school when he toured it last year, because it allows the airline to meet its substantial need for workers. The school uses it to feed its three flight markets — domestic, trans-African and long haul.