Looking ahead, MROs recruit skilled technicians
“There was always talk of the labor shortage in the MRO market of ‘Mr.

“There was always talk of the labor shortage in the MRO market of ‘Mr. Right Skills,’ a shortage so bad that we’d be grounding planes,” said David Stewart, a partner in forecasting group AeroStrategy. “First of all, we never grounded planes, so somehow our industry coped with the shortage. Second, we’re now into recession so it’s less of an issue.

“There are some MROs, like SR Technics, that have laid people off in Ireland, or Sabena Technics in Brussels,” said Stewart, who also chairs the maintenance, repair and overhaul & logistics group of the Society of British Aerospace Companies (SBAC).