Sep. 12—Under a massive American Airlines hangar just outside Pittsburgh International Airport, crews of technicians work around the clock to keep passenger jets airborne and secure.
Daniel Rodriguez, 27, describes it as "the best job I ever had."
His team is growing, as American Airlines adds 500 new aircraft maintenance workers across the country, including more than 40 technicians in Pittsburgh by the end of the year.
The expansion builds on the legacy of a shop that has diligently served multiple airlines through consolidation and bankruptcy scares.
"We had a lot of ripples in the water along the way," said technical crew chief Steven Oehme, 62, who has worked at the hangar for the past 37 years.
But what hasn't changed in that time is the quality of the work, he said. "We're the best there is."
Greg Emerson, American Airlines' vice president of base maintenance, agrees.
When it comes to fixing up the airline's staple fleet of Airbus 320s, Pittsburgh's technicians are "the best in the business," he said.
He credits much of that talent to the Pittsburgh Institute of Aeronautics, a trade school that helps young technicians get certified with the Federal Aviation Administration straight out of high school.
One such graduate, Anthony Emmi, 27, oversees nearly 3,000 mechanics, and is the third generation of his family to work at the Pittsburgh hangar.
He said he originally dreamed of being a pilot but quickly realized "I needed to work with my hands."
The benefits and pay at American Airlines immediately appealed to Mr. Emmi, who was valedictorian of PIA's Youngstown branch, and after a brief stint in Tulsa, he was able to relocate to Pittsburgh.
Mr. Rodriguez joined the team from Miami. "Compared to what I'm used to, this is great. I'm learning a lot," he said.
The maintenance projects at the bay vary by the day, encompassing both routine wear and tear and damage sustained on the runway or in flight.
"We choose not to use the word 'problems,' " said Mr. Emerson, the vice president. "As an aircraft flies, it's no different than your car."
"You typically have to take your car in for oil changes, tire rotations, and then as it gets older, you'll end up having to do transmission work or engine work or body work."
Same with aircraft, he said. "It's a constant, never-ending cycle."
When all goes well, the team in Hangar 5 operate behind the scenes, Mr. Emerson said. But their work is crucial to ensuring planes operate safely for years.
"Our entire world revolves around safety and compliance," he said. "That is the number one mission."
"We [don't] just go out and fix a problem on an airplane and walk away from it. We have second-set-of-eyes inspections. We have audits on top of that, and we monitor the engineering and reliability of these airplanes too, all the time, constantly."
As people cranked away on engines three times their size, took apart panels and inspected the interior guts of an Airbus A321 and two other jets on Thursday, Mr. Oehme took a beat to think about the shop's legacy.
By his estimate, he has worked on thousands of planes over past three decades, including various models with dozens of defects.
"There's never a surprise," Mr. Oehme said. "You see everything."
The only surprise to his mind is that the shop is still operating.
"We expected we were going be the ones to turn the lights off here," he said.
Now, it feels like they have more staff than in the 1980s.
Mr. Emerson said the expansion signals that "we have a healthy industry." The Pittsburgh hangar has already doubled its specialized workforce to about 300 over the past two years.
The new influx will help technicians do heavier overhauls, pushing two-week jobs to up to a month, Mr. Emerson said. His advice to interested youngsters? "Start early."
Entry level positions start at $80,000.
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