Breaking Barriers: Women Charter and Corporate Pilots

How many women fly as charter and corporate pilots in the U.S.?

Women hold approximately 4.9% of FAA Airline Transport Pilot certificates and an estimated 6 to 8% of seats in Part 135 charter and Part 91 corporate flight departments, according to FAA airman certification data and NBAA workforce surveys. The number is higher than the 4.4% recorded a decade ago but lower than the roughly 9 to 10% women represent in the Part 121 airline pilot pool at carriers like United and Delta.

The reason for the gap between airlines and business aviation is structural. Major airlines run published seniority lists, transparent pay scales, and bid-line scheduling. Charter and corporate hiring runs on referrals, type-rating commitments, and on-demand schedules that resist the predictability working parents — male or female — tend to require. When the pipeline is referral-driven and the existing population is 93% male, the math compounds.

Why is the gender gap wider in business aviation than at the airlines?

The gap is wider because business aviation hires through networks, demands schedule flexibility that punishes caregivers, and historically required the candidate to fund their own type rating on aircraft like the Gulfstream G650, Global 7500, or Citation Longitude. A type rating on a heavy-iron Gulfstream runs $30,000 to $60,000 out of pocket if an operator will not sponsor it.

Charter and fractional flying also carries a residential unpredictability the airlines do not. A NetJets or Flexjet pilot on a 7-and-7 or 8-and-6 rotation can be sent anywhere in the continental U.S. or Europe with limited notice. A Part 135 charter captain at an operator like Solairus, Jet Linx, or Clay Lacy may fly 350 to 500 hours a year on trips that materialize 12 hours before departure. The scheduling model selects for pilots without primary caregiving responsibility, and U.S. caregiving still falls disproportionately on women.

The hiring pipeline itself is a second filter. Corporate flight departments at Fortune 500 companies — think the in-house operations at firms running Gulfstream G700s and Global 7500s — hire perhaps one or two pilots a year, almost always through word-of-mouth. NBAA's 2023 compensation survey put the median corporate pilot tenure above 12 years, meaning seats rarely open and rarely advertise.

Which operators are actually moving the number?

NetJets, Flexjet, Wheels Up, and Jet Aviation have run the most visible recruitment and type-rating sponsorship programs aimed at women candidates. NetJets has publicly committed to type-rating sponsorship through its Aviation Career Purpose Program and partners with the Organization of Black Aerospace Professionals and Sisters of the Skies on direct hiring pipelines. Flexjet's pilot recruitment has expanded sponsored type-rating tracks on the Praetor 500/600 and Gulfstream G650, which removes the single largest financial barrier for a regional or Part 135 pilot moving into fractional flying.

NBAA runs the Business Aviation Top Hangar competition and a Career Development Program that has placed women candidates into corporate flight departments at firms including Walmart Aviation and Berkshire Hathaway's flight operation. The NBAA Schedulers & Dispatchers Conference, while not pilot-focused, has become one of the more reliable lateral entry points into business aviation for women already working in operations.

Sisters of the Skies, founded by Captain M'Lis Ward and others, has expanded beyond its original airline focus to fund type ratings and mentorship for women pursuing corporate and charter careers. The organization's scholarship pool sits in the low six figures annually, with named awards covering Citation, King Air, and Gulfstream type ratings.

What scholarships and pathways exist specifically for charter and corporate tracks?

The most directly relevant funding sources are Women in Aviation International's annual scholarship pool, which awarded more than $1.4 million at its 2024 Orlando conference; the Ninety-Nines Amelia Earhart Memorial Scholarship for advanced ratings; and operator-sponsored type ratings from NetJets, Flexjet, and Jet Linx. The WAI scholarship roster routinely includes type-rating awards from FlightSafety International and CAE on aircraft directly relevant to charter work — Citation CJ3, King Air 350, Phenom 300.

Whirly-Girls International funds rotorcraft ratings that map directly to corporate helicopter operations at firms like BlackRock, which runs an in-house S-76 program, and the various Manhattan-based Part 135 helicopter charters. The ISA+21 organization, originally formed by the first 21 women hired as airline captains, mentors women crossing into corporate captain seats and has expanded its directory work to include Part 135 and Part 91 operators.

Direct pathways into corporate flying still run primarily through Part 135 charter time. A typical progression is regional airline or Part 135 SIC, upgrade to PIC with 1,500 to 2,500 hours, lateral move into a fractional like NetJets or Flexjet, and eventually a corporate flight department seat. Each rung depends on someone making a phone call, which is why mentorship networks matter more in this segment than in airline hiring.

What changes when the cockpit is no longer 95% male?

Operators that have actively diversified report measurable retention gains, lower training washout rates, and stronger safety culture metrics. Beverley Bass — who became American Airlines' third female captain in 1986 and later commanded the Boeing 777 famously diverted to Gander on 9/11 — has been explicit in industry talks that the operational case is independent of the social one. The same logic applies to business aviation, where a single pilot resignation can cost an operator $200,000 to $400,000 in replacement training and lost utilization.

Captain Tammie Jo Shults, the former Navy F/A-18 pilot who landed Southwest 1380 after an uncontained engine failure in 2018, came up through a military pipeline that the corporate world increasingly targets directly. Military transition programs at Textron, Gulfstream, and the major fractionals now actively recruit women separating from Navy, Air Force, and Marine aviation — a pool where women represent roughly 7 to 9% of pilots and where type-rating-equivalent experience already exists.

The number to watch is not the headline percentage but the captain-upgrade rate. A flight department that hires women as first officers but never upgrades them to PIC has not moved. The operators worth taking seriously publish their captain demographics, sponsor the type rating that makes the upgrade possible, and build schedules that let a pilot — any pilot — sustain a career past year five.