Why Are More Than 90 Percent of Pilots Still Men?
Originally published by Amelia Gentleman for The Guardian
Sometimes passengers congratulate Maria Pernia-Digings, 61, on her parking. When she tells me this, she tries to laugh it off as a tiny slight, barely worth commenting on. Others don’t bother to hide their shock, and greet her as they leave the plane with blunt amazement: “Oh, you’re a woman!”
“It’s lovely. People are very supportive,” she says, before conceding she finds some of the feedback extremely trying. Remembering the last male passenger to compliment her on her parking, she says: “It is a bit sad, isn’t it, if he thinks that because I’m a woman, I can’t park?”
She feels equally weary about the effusive support from some travellers, gushing phrases such as: “Girl power!” She wears a blue easyJet pilot suit with four silver stripes on the cuffs, indicating her senior rank. “I don’t like to be made to feel different,” she says.