Flight training program to open

By Ed Runyan

VIENNA — The Trumbull Career and Technical Center, working together with the Western Reserve Flight Center and the Community College of Beaver County, is starting a flight-training program in January to prepare individuals for jobs as airline pilots and air-traffic controllers.

The program, outlined at a press conference at the Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport on Wednesday, involves ground and instrument training at the TCTC campus in Champion and flight and instrument flight training at the airport.

The first two parts of the training cost $675 for the ground school and $6,950 for the flight training.

Daryl Stinson, air traffic manager at the FAA control tower in Vienna, said about half of the 17 air-traffic controllers and six trainees at the Vienna tower graduated from the Community College of Beaver County.

The local training will count toward the associate-level air-traffic-control degree program at the community college and can also be used as a prerequisite for application to the U.S. Air Force Youngstown Reserve flight-training program, officials said.

The training also can be used to pursue a private pilot’s license for personal use.

Carmen Romeo, aviation director at the community college, which is in Aliquippa, Pa., said students completing the school’s air-traffic- control program with at least a B grade average have a 100 percent placement rate into a job.

Starting salaries are around $43,000, and the jobs pay between $65,000 and $119,000 after three years’ experience, he said.

Because former President Ronald Reagan fired Federal Aviation Administration air-traffic controllers in 1981 over labor issues and new controllers were hired at that time, the FAA will need about 17,000 new air-traffic controllers in the next 10 years to replace those retiring, Romeo said.

Air-traffic controllers must retire by age 56 and cannot be hired after age 31, he said. Air-traffic controllers can retire after 25 years of service.

Major Chris Swegan, 38, of Aurora, an Austintown native who earned his private-pilot’s license at the Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport as a teenager, is now a pilot for Southwest Airlines. He also flies C-130s for the Air Force at the Youngstown Air Reserve Station.

Swegan said most commercial pilots have a bachelor’s degree in addition to training at a community college such as the one in Beaver County.

Commercial pilots working for the major airlines make around $60,000 by their second year, about $120,000 by their fifth year and around $200,000 by their 12th year, Swegan said.

For more information, contact Vicki Thompson at TCTC at (330) 847-0503, ext. 1601, or the Western Reserve Flight Center at (330) 369-UFLY.