Page 15 - AAA MARCH - APRIL 2019 Online Magazine

also actively involved in building up the AMT Brett Levanto told Congress in September last year. Contrary to
workforce. Its Luton-based training academy common perception that the aviation industry is dominated by big
delivered European Aviation Safety Agency companies, “small businesses are the rule, rather than the excep-
Part 147 and United Arab Emirates General tion,” he added. Unfilled positions cost U.S. maintenance companies
Civil Aviation Authority CAR 147 aircraft type $1.95 billion in lost opportunity and foregone revenue each year,
training. the association projected in 2017.

“The labour gap in the MRO industry is a reality Changing Nature of the Job
that we all face, therefore, we all share in the With new generation airplanes become more prominent in the
responsibility to grow the number of qualified, global fleet, the future generation of AMTs will work in an environ-
highly-skilled workers in the field by elevating ment much different than their predecessors have. According to
the role of mechanics and technicians within a 2017 survey of MRO executives by Oliver Wyman, three emerg-
our industry,” says Avocet CEO Patrick Arellano ing technologies will be a major part of the workload for the next
Sr. “Everybody knows there is a shortage of generation of mechanics - composite material repair and manu-
qualified AMTs, and we want to help fix the facture, collection and reporting of data for advanced analytics,
problem,” says Edward Gray, Avocet General big data, and predictive maintenance, as well as ever-developing
Manager and Chief of Operations. “The appren- avionics and electrical systems. The days of an AMT not being
ticeship program helps the local community. tech-savvy are numbered, if not already gone. Industry experts
There are many youngsters who aren’t going believe that technological advances that the industry has witnessed
to college but would like to learn a good living; in recent years will help MRO companies cope, to an extent, with
we take them in and teach them on the airplane the shortage of qualified technicians. Augmented reality and virtual
for 36 months. We give them two or three gen-
eral familiarization courses. When they leave,
they have their AMT certificate as well as the
general familiarization courses.”

Gray is aware that students who go through the
internship and apprenticeship programs might
end up seeking a job elsewhere. “All the airlines
look to the MROs to take the good people and
we already know that. We are therefore looking
for a good partner that we can guide the people
towards. We are currently in discussions with
a couple of different airlines.”

UNFILLED POSITIONS COST U.S.
MAINTENANCE COMPANIES
US $1.95 BILLION IN LOST
OPPORTUNITY AND FOREGONE reality have the potential to simplify maintenance processes and
REVENUE EACH YEAR, THE offer expert guidance to newly qualified technicians remotely, thus
AERONAUTICAL REPAIR STATION cutting maintenance time and costs. The benefits of using VR in
ASSOCIATION (ARSA) PROJECTED training programs are so substantial that experts believe that it
could shave one or two years off traditional maintenance engi-
IN 2017 neer training programs. Some companies are already using AR to
support their training programs and help new hires ease into their
The lack of enough qualified technicians jobs; in 2016, Engine MRO specialist TAE came out with Fountx, a
have forced some MRO companies to delay wearable augmented-reality system that enables a remote expert
adding new capabilities. Some others have had to support a technician in real-time.
to turn down work and delay facility expan-
sion. While larger MRO firms will be able to Worsening Crisis
tide over the crisis, the shortage of qualified It is a growing crisis. According to projections by Oliver Wyman,
technicians might prove fatal for smaller com- the gap between the supply of qualified mechanics and demand
panies that do not have the capital to invest for them will develop in the United States by 2022 and reach a
in programs to grow their workforce. Of the peak of nine percent by 2027 as a record number of maintenance
4,900 aviation maintenance firms worldwide, technicians become eligible to retire during the period. The Asia
81 percent are small and medium sized compa- Pacific region will be hit hard even earlier, experts say. 72 percent of
nies, Aeronautical Repair Station Association those who took part in the 2017 Oliver Wyman said they expected
(ARSA) Vice President of Communications the search for qualified candidates to get much harder.

ASIAN AIRLINES & AEROSPACE March/April 2019 | 15