American says PIT ‘Fits the Bill’ to Add Maintenance Jobs

American Airlines is adding hundreds of new maintenance jobs throughout its system, and many of them are coming to Pittsburgh.

Last week, the airline announced it is creating 500 additional aviation maintenance positions, including 385 licensed aviation maintenance technicians (AMTs) at its bases in Charlotte, Pittsburgh and Tulsa. American is also adding more heavy maintenance lines to provide in-depth service at the three locations.

The airline is adding 44 of those positions – including 40 AMTs – at its maintenance facility at Pittsburgh International Airport. Additionally, American is transitioning one of its lines at PIT to one that will perform heavy maintenance checks, which many of the new jobs will support.

It’s the latest investment by American into its PIT maintenance base, which it is aggressively growing to meet the needs of servicing its fleet.

This year, the Pittsburgh base expects to have nearly 360 AMTs, more than double its staffing from August 2022, and plans additional growth to support approximately 600 jobs in total by 2025.

The staffing additions have transformed Pittsburgh into the second-largest maintenance base for American, after Tulsa. Locally, the base also includes supply chain resources, inspectors, aircraft cleaning, planning, engineering and other support staff.

“We’ve been here in Pittsburgh a long time and our workforce is tenured here. There’s a lot of experience,” said Greg Emerson, American’s vice president of base maintenance. “Pittsburgh is a foundational strategic environment for us in the future, and we want to make sure we continue to leverage this facility.”

The expansion of jobs also is important to PIT as the airport contributes to regional economic development, officials said.

“American Airlines is a key partner and we are so pleased to work with them as they continue to grow their maintenance base at PIT,” said Bryan Dietz, senior vice president of Air Service and Commercial Development for the Allegheny County Airport Authority.

“The mechanics here are the best in the business, many of whom were trained at Pittsburgh Institute of Aeronautics at Allegheny County Airport. The hundreds of jobs at the base are a prime example of how the airport authority and its partners help drive economic development for the region.”

Pittsburgh’s prominent role

American’s PIT maintenance base services the airline’s fleet of narrowbody Airbus A320 family aircraft, which are mainstays on short and medium-haul routes throughout the carrier’s network. American operates the A319, A320, A321 and A321neo aircraft, which seat between 128 and 196 passengers.

Of the more than 1,000 total aircraft in American’s fleet, nearly half are in the Airbus A320 family, making American the largest operator of the series worldwide. That number will rise over the next several years after American finalized an order for 85 additional A321neo aircraft in March. The airline is also due to receive its first of 50 A321XLRs from Airbus later this year.

More planes means more maintenance duties, Emerson said. “What we are trying to do is strategically maneuver the type of work that we need to do. In Pittsburgh, for our Airbus A320 family aircraft, this is the right location for that.”

American’s Pittsburgh maintenance base is designated as an “Airbus Center of Excellence.” The facility specializes in maintaining American’s A320 family aircraft and can house up to three aircraft simultaneously inside its primary hangar at PIT.

“Having a facility like the American Airlines maintenance base here at Pittsburgh International is an outstanding economic opportunity to bring more jobs into Pittsburgh,” Rep. Valerie Gaydos told Blue Sky News after touring the base earlier this year. “It’s super important to have the base here because of the number of high paying jobs it has, mostly in the trades.”

As part of its announcement last week, American will transition one of Pittsburgh’s C-check lines (mid-level maintenance) into an S-check line (heavy maintenance). “As we look at the demand that we have for the A320 and the type of maintenance that’s coming due, we definitely need that additional capacity to do heavier lines of work,” Emerson said, adding that Pittsburgh “fits the bill” for American.

A C-check is a moderate level maintenance check an aircraft undergoes approximately every three years of its service life and usually takes 10-15 days to complete. An S-check is a heavier, more rigorous maintenance an aircraft undergoes approximately every six years and typically lasts 30-40 days.

S-checks introduce full structural inspections of an aircraft. This usually involves the removal of seats, galleys, sidewalls, overhead bins, carpeting and flooring and other interior fittings that require additional manpower.

In addition, the Pittsburgh facility also performs “special visits” for American: aircraft with a specific issue that needs to be fixed. In 2023, American’s PIT facility performed work on 13 aircraft in for special visits.

All of that work is done by staff designated as “base” mechanics. Another group known as “line” mechanics focus on the aircraft that fly in and out of PIT each day. They do routine maintenance and inspection tasks as well as brief scheduled checks on planes that stay overnight before departing in the morning on the next day’s flights.

A unique attribute carried by the maintenance base staff in Pittsburgh is an enormous level of experience in aircraft maintenance. Many of American’s workers at PIT began their careers when the base was part of US Airways’ Pittsburgh hub, with some starting even earlier.

“I was amazed to find out that there were people here who have been working here for 55 years and are multi-generational,” Gaydos said. “The best part about it is that people actually love working, not just here, but with each other.”

“Saying they’re the best in the business is not a stretch for us,” Emerson said. “We believe we have the experts on the Airbus airframe from a heavy maintenance perspective in this hangar.”

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A job in high demand

In recent years, the aviation industry has repeatedly warned of a growing mechanics shortage driven by an aging workforce, lack of younger generation workers and perceived barriers.

Data from the Aviation Technician Education Council (ATEC) found that 30 percent of aviation mechanics are at or near retirement age, while new entrants only make up 2 percent of the workforce each year. Meanwhile, Boeing’s Pilot and Technical Outlook projects that the aviation industry will need about 610,000 mechanics over the next 20 years while the Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that there will be about 13,400 openings for aircraft and avionics equipment mechanics and technicians each year through 2033.

Fortunately for American, the airline taps into the nearby Pittsburgh Institute of Aeronautics (PIA), one of the nation’s premier aviation mechanic schools. Located at Allegheny County Airport (AGC) in nearby West Mifflin since the 1930s, PIA has received national acclaim for successfully developing students into professional mechanics, most recently being named as a Top Two-Year Trade School by Forbes in 2018.

Students at PIA complete a 20-month course to be certified to work on commercial aircraft and then move into jobs with starting salaries ranging from $50,000 to $55,000 a year. Typically, graduates start at smaller regional carriers like Republic Airways, which flies the American Eagle brand at PIT, before moving onto legacy airlines like American, which typically pays more.

“We have a great connective tissue to the PIA and the community in Allegheny County,” Emerson said, adding that many of American’s maintenance workers at PIT are PIA alumni. “PIA is super important for us as well because they’re breeding the next generation of airframe maintenance licenses.”

Certified applicants can visit American’s website to apply for jobs in Pittsburgh. The airline expects openings for future generation mechanics to be available in Pittsburgh over the next several years as it continues to add jobs in the region.

Once hired by American, Emerson says new mechanics will have the opportunity to learn from its highly experienced workforce in Pittsburgh. “As we bring in the next generation of aviation maintenance technicians, they’re going to be trained by the best. That is extremely important.”