Regional airlines in Australia's aviation-reliant north west are feeling the pinch of a critical shortage of engineers, with an industry figure saying it's a "looming crisis".
It comes after major airlines around the country experienced delays, flight cancellations and reduced services amid staff-shortages and increased demand.
Cancellations at Broome Airport have forced residents to take stranded passengers into their homes as hotels were booked out during the busy dry season.
Qantas said cancellations at the airport were in part due to "engineering requirements" and a full-time engineer was sent to alleviate the ongoing issues.
But regional airlines in WA are also feeling the pinch, with industry figures saying while most of the attention has focused on pilot shortages, engineering shortages are a bigger issue.
Shortages hit small operators
Aviair managing director Michael McConarchy said the shortage could spell disaster for smaller aviation operators relied on in many parts of Western Australia.
"What will happen is [the] industry will start and maybe continue feeding on itself to try to get additional engineers," Mr McConachy said.
"You're going to see a number of the smaller operators fall out the bottom end as a result, and even some of the bigger operators are going to struggle."
He said the skills shortage could lead to safety concerns.
"Where there's a supply shortage of engineers, then there's more pressure on operators to achieve the same or more with less, and that's not a good thing," he said.
"The industry have been talking about this for the last 10 years as the 'looming crisis' and yet here we are and very little has been done to solve the problem."
He said the state could turn the issue to its advantage.
"I do think that there's a great opportunity ... for Western Australia to set up better training facilities and support those and encourage youth into the opportunities of aviation engineering," he said.
Filling the skill gap
Regional Aviation Association of Australia chief executive Steve Campbell said the organisation met with the federal government last week to address problems with training and make it easier to bring engineers in from overseas.
“We're trying to get aircraft maintenance engineers onto what's called the priority migration, occupation skills list,” Mr Campbell said.
“The time frames, I'm being told, are nine to 12 months wait, even after they've identified a suitable candidate, so that's great cause for concern for our members.”
Mr Campbell said the shortfall had been compounded in north-west WA by engineers moving into mining jobs and less people entering the industry due to COVID-related travel restrictions.
“The pilot shortage headlines seem to get the big attraction ... they're forgetting the real problem that is out there, which is the engineer shortage," he said.
Not enough engineers being trained
Australian Licensed Aircraft Engineers Association federal secretary Steve Purvinas said the industry was not training enough people and too many were retiring.
“There's no replenishment at the bottom of the industry, and as a result, as people get to retirement age, the shortages are just going to snowball over the upcoming years," he said.
Mr Purvinas recalled being part of a class of 250 apprentice engineers when he started in 1986, but lamented that major airlines now put on a "big celebration if they put on half a dozen apprentices".
"They've just decided we're not going to train anyone at the bottom end, and we're going to just grab them when we need them off the magical tree that doesn't exist," Mr Purvinas said.
“Eventually, I'm concerned, the whole system is going to collapse.”
