State Aviation Journal
Kim Stevens and Patrick Arnzen
17 August 2026
If your flight was delayed or canceled this summer, weather or mass travelers probably got the blame. But behind many of the disruptions travelers experience is a staffing problem that reaches across aviation: the industry doesn’t have enough trained people to keep pace with demand.
Boeing’s latest outlook says the industry will need 674,000 new pilots through 2045, up from 660,000 in last year’s forecast, and that number tells only part of the story. Aviation needs pilots in large numbers, but it also needs enough mechanics, dispatchers and air traffic controllers to support every flight those pilots operate...
