There is no question that it’s getting hard to find qualified aircraft technicians. It’s partly a demographic problem (baby boomers not having enough babies) and more likely due to crappy pay and benefits and quality of life. The result has been low levels of new entrants into aviation maintenance and consequent shortages causing higher prices for service and companies scrambling to find qualified personnel.
Despite all the talk about the shortage, I see nothing new on the horizon on how to solve this problem. Watch any group come together to discuss a personnel shortage, and the only solution they ever come up with is to try to get kids as young as kindergartners interested in aviation careers. Guess what? Every other industry on the planet is doing the same! Those poor kids, their heads must be spinning with all the opportunities.
Matt Thurber, editor-in-chief at AIN Media Group, has been flying since 1975 and writing about aviation since 1978 and now has the best job in the world, running editorial operations for Aviation International News, Business Jet Traveler, and FutureFlight.aero. In addition to working as an A&P mechanic on everything from Piper Cubs to turboprops, Matt taught flying at his father’s flight school in Plymouth, Mass., in the early 1980s, flew for an aircraft owner/pilot, and for two summer seasons hunted swordfish near the George’s Banks off the East Coast from a Piper Super Cub. An ATP certificated fixed-wing pilot and CFII and commercial helicopter pilot, Matt is type-rated in the Citation 500 and Gulfstream V/550. Based in the Pacific Northwest, Matt and his team cover the entire aviation scene including business aircraft, helicopters, avionics, safety, manufacturing, charter, fractionals, technology, air transport, advanced air mobility, defense, and other subjects of interest to AIN, BJT, and FutureFlight readers.
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