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A female pilot’s journey to the cockpit
Jo Anne Toral used to view the world from a small window in the back of the plane.
She would bunk up with her fellow flight attendants and peek out as the world slipped past below her. She would dream of being in command of the plane—but had been discouraged when she was younger, after being told that airlines preferred male pilots.
“Ever since I was young, I was interested sa flying because of my dad. He was a pilot. I asked that question before sa dad ko, siguro around 6 years old and 7. ‘Are women allowed to be pilots?’” Jo Anne said in an interview with GMA News Online.
She recalls Captain Antonio Toral crouching down in full uniform and telling her that there were only three or four female pilots in the airline he worked for at the time.
“He said... they didn’t really prefer women because they get rattled easily. So ni-let go ko yung idea na 'yun, pero at the back of my mind nandun pa rin siya,” she continued.
Two decades later, Jo Anne has made her way into the cockpit, the world as her destination.
Working as a First Officer in Cebu Pacific Airlines since late 2016, Jo Anne has flown more than 60 flights, and monitored nearly as many. It has been a dream come true for the 27-year-old, but getting there was far from easy.
Jo Anne took up nursing in college, but had a hard time looking for a job in the field. She then worked as a flight attendant for three years before finally applying for flight school.
She trained at Alpha Aviation in Clark, Pampanga for 15 months.
“The treatment was the same. Wala namang special treatment. That’s what I like,” she said.
Alpha Aviation has produced 54 female pilots out of its 800 or so male graduates and undergraduates.
Currently, only 3% of commercial pilots worldwide are women.
Sitting in her old school’s flight simulator, one of three that students use to train without getting off the ground, Jo Anne contemplated finally being able to see the view from the front.
“Sometimes may days pa rin na di ako makapaniwala na ako na yung lumilipad,” she said.
She admits that she still feels the need to prove herself, especially to older male colleagues.
“Sometimes, may kalipad ka na medyo old-school ang thinking. 'Di ba pag babae medyo...' Hindi ganon kataas ang expectation nila. You just have to prove na kaya mo ang flying and eventually, you gain a certain amount of respect from your male counterparts,” Jo Anne said.
Being a pilot is demanding, said Jo Anne: time pressures lead to ruined sleep patterns and a healthy amount of stress. But once she’s in the air, she said, all the bad things go away.
“You have to wake up at 1 in the morning, and then get to fly at 3 or 3:30 a.m., but when you see the sunrise, it takes it all away,” she said.
Jo Anne hopes that public perception of flying as a male-only profession will change, and that more women will decide to go on the same career path.
“I feel like the gender barriers are slowly being collapsed,” she said. “If you set your mind on what you really want to do, you can do it, just with hard work and determination.
“Society has gender biases and expectations of you as a woman...Don’t let anyone tell you what to do. Just follow your heart.” — BM, GMA News
