Flightstar lands 200 more jobs

JACKSONVILLE — Flightstar Aircraft Services Inc. said it plans to hire 200 people over the next six months due to increased business repairing aircraft and converting passenger jets into cargo planes.

The ramp-up in work is expected to increase the Jacksonville company’s revenue next year by at least 15 percent to $57.5 million, said Matt Eaton, Flightstar vice president for corporate development. The growth of Cecil Field’s largest employer highlights the Westside center’s niche in repairing and overhauling aircraft, which is shared by fellow tenants Boeing Co. and the U.S. Navy’s Fleet Readiness Center Southeast, said Bob Simpson, the Jacksonville Aviation Authority’s Cecil Field director.

Eaton said the average salary for the new hires will be more than $40,000 and the aircraft mechanics and service technicians will make more than the local annual average, which is about $50,000, according to the Florida Agency for Workforce Innovation.

Flightstar, which will employ 700 with the new hires, lost 32 people in 2009 when work slumped, though most of the job losses were due to attrition, Eaton said.

Flightstar’s new $20 million, 130,000-square-foot hangar also houses an aircraft painting facility that will allow the company to strip and paint, instead of just sanding and painting, Eaton said. About $10 million for construction of the hangar by Dana B. Kenyon Co. came through a state grant awarded to Florida State College at Jacksonville.

Starting next year, the college will use the facility to give aviation and aerospace students on-site training, said Gene Milowicki, director of aviation programs for the facility, known as the Aviation Center of Excellence. The college is hiring a facility instructor and plans to add more as the program grows.

Eaton said the strengthening of existing repair customers — such as FedEx Corp. and Allegiant Air — and acquiring contracts to repair AirTran Airways, USA Jet Airlines and Miami Air International jets have ramped up Flightstar’s work. Along with its existing contracts to convert Boeing 757 passenger jets to cargo planes, the company also recently gained a contract to do the same with eight Boeing 737 passenger jets.

“The diminishing value of used aircraft also make it more feasible to pay for the conversion,” Eaton said.

The more-than-$6 million contract from Miami-based Aeronautical Engineers Inc. will require the same process of stripping the jets and stabilizing their frames so a hole wide enough to fit containers through can be cut without damaging the plane’s structure. The Boeing 737 jets are smaller than their 757 counterparts and were designed for regional, short-haul flights, Eaton said.

This makes them an ideal fit for developing countries in the Middle East, Africa and South America, said Robert Convey, Aeronautical Engineers’ vice president of sales and marketing. The U.S. and European markets are “very mature,” but developing regions need more regional air cargo transport as they grow.

Convey said the used Boeing 737 passenger jets cost about $4 million apiece, and it costs about $3 million to convert and repair them. Although a Boeing 727 can be bought for $250,000, the aging plane requires an extra crew member and has nearly reached the end of its life after being retired from passenger service.

It takes about 30 Flightstar technicians a little more than three months to convert a passenger jet into a cargo plane. The conversion work accounts for about 30 percent of the company’s revenue, with the rest gained through repair and maintenance contracts.

More jobs will be added at Cecil, Simpson said, as the Fleet Readiness Center grows its Westside work force by 40 to 266 when it expands into a 60,000-square-foot hangar next month.

Increased work to overhaul F/A-18 aircraft spurred the center, which has its main operations at Naval Air Station Jacksonville, to expand its existing operations at a 70,000-square-foot hangar at Cecil Field, Simpson said. Earlier this year, Boeing announced it would increase its work force at Cecil Field by 40 to 285 to modify F-16 aircraft into 126 QF-16 drones.

The company moved about 60 jobs from Arizona to the area last year to consolidate its F/A-18 maintenance operations.

Although the engines it overhauls are for industrial and marine uses, Pratt & Whitney also employs 50 at Cecil Field.


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