Succeeding with Safety in Mind

When she pictured her future, Izzy (Klink) Double always saw herself working on rockets. What she didn’t expect was to fall in love with becoming an airplane mechanic — or as she refers to it, “a plane doctor. ”

Double originally enrolled at Penn State to study aerospace engineering and astrophysics, but she quickly realized it wasn’t the right fit: “I’m a very hands-on person, but there was nothing hands-on about those classes and I found myself getting really bored.” Instead, she found the right fit at PIA.

“As one of the only females in my AMT program, I felt like I had to work harder just to prove myself,” said Double. Her can-do attitude served her well: just two weeks after graduating PIA, she was hired as an A&P mechanic at Bombardier, where she spent nearly two years traveling from West Virginia to Kansas to Texas, working on CRJs, Challengers, Globals, and Learjets.

“I gained an insane amount of knowledge right off the bat about how heavy maintenance works for both regional and corporate aircraft, and also how line maintenance works,” said Double. “The line really pushes you to use your knowledge and skills fast. People have places to go, and safely. They’re depending on you.”

In 2019, Double began her current job at Flexjet, a leader in private luxury jets, where she’s expanding her versatility by adding Phenoms, Legacies, Praetors, and Gulfstreams to her repair repertoire. “My plate is full every single day from 1:00 PM to 1:30 AM,” said Double. “I may start my day on a Challenger, bounce to a Gulfstream, then a Phenom, then back to the Challenger all before I even get to lunch at 6. And part shortages can really keep the hop in my step all night, plus any planes that come in broken at night and need to be fixed by morning.”

Double loves her work at Flexjet, which included the opportunity to speak at the 2022 International Women in Aviation (WAI) conference in Nashville. “I got to speak for the Association for Women in Aviation Maintenance (AWAM) representing Flexjet, which was an absolute honor beyond measure,” says Double. “I also got to meet so many women just like me, which was so refreshing, and connect with so many amazing future / current A&Ps, pilots, attendants, flight crew, military — it was such an incredible experience.”

Of all the lessons Double has learned so far, she says the most important was a simple comment she heard at PIA:

“In my 6th quarter, Mr. Simon told us: ‘Whatever you’re fixing, you have to think about it like your family is going to be flying on it.’ That really stuck with me. So now every day I picture my mom flying on whatever I’m fixing. That helps me remember there are never any shortcuts to doing this job right.”