New WAI chief to focus on expanding membership

CEO Allison McKay succeeds former President and CEO Peggy Chabrian, who founded WAI in 1990. Most recently a vice president with Helicopter Association International, McKay said she wants to build the WAI membership by emphasizing that it is an organization for all women in aviation. McKay noted that while she has worked in aviation her entire career, “I’m always saying, ‘I’m not flying it, I’m not fixing it, but I’m supporting it.’” 

“Women in Aviation has been known as an organization that supports pilots,” McKay said March 6 at the annual conference in Orlando, Florida. “Recently it’s brought mechanics into the fold. I want it to be an organization for all women in aviation.” She said she wants to encourage more industry segments to join the association. WAI’s membership has doubled since its formation in 1990, and now is at more than 16,000 members, including 4,300 student members and more than 1,000 international members representing 90 countries.

McKay said she’ll also work to retain members, noting that the organization’s membership has different age groups. “At various times in your career your needs are different,” she said. Members represent “a lot of different categories, and how do we create member benefits for each of those life cycles?”

On March 7 WAI inducted Maj. Gen. Jeannie Leavitt, airshow pilot Patty Wagner, and the U.S. Army’s first women rotary wing pilots into its Pioneer Hall of Fame. Leavitt was the first female fighter pilot to fly the U.S. Air Force’s McDonnell Douglas F–15E Strike Eagle. She is currently commander of the Air Force Recruiting Service in San Antonio. Wagner and her husband, Bob, created a wing walking act and have flown in all 50 states and “British Columbia, Quebec, every Canadian province in between, and in South America.” She is retired from the airshow circuit and volunteers with the Waco Historical Society and other aviation organizations. The nine women who were the “first women in rotary wing aviation to serve in the U.S. Army” are Lieutenants Sally Murphy, Linda Horan DuMoulin, Susan Dunwoody Schoeck, and Beverly Birkholtz; and Warrant Officers Jennie Vallance, Diane Dowd, Susan Boring, Lavern Fransworth, and Mary Reid. “None of these women had the benefit of being assigned with other female aviators providing support, encouragement, or advice,” WAI said.

The WAI 2021 international conference will take place March 11 through 13 in Reno, Nevada.