Yellowknife (May 24/06) - The opportunity to develop skills that couldn't be acquired anywhere else was what brought Stephen Terry to Yellowknife.

He chose to come to the North to gain valuable work experience towards his aircraft maintenance engineer licence.

Stephen Terry works on a float plane outside the Air Tindi hangar. Terry recently received his aircraft maintenance engineer licence after doing a personal apprenticeship for four years. - David Ryan/NNSL photo

"The kind of experience I'm gaining here, I wouldn't get it anywhere else," Terry said.

After completing a two-year course at Canadore College in North Bay, Ont., Terry decided to make the jump to Yellowknife in 2002.

Four years later, he's compiled enough hours to get his Transport Canada aircraft maintenance engineer licence.

Terry needed to fill out a course-specific logbook and spend 30 working months as an apprentice before he could become certified.

As an aircraft maintenance engineer with Air Tindi, Terry is able to work on a variety of different planes including floats and ski aircraft.

Being able to use his skills on a number of different types of aircraft allows him to be versatile, he said.

"I just want to keep on learning. There's always new things to learn," he said.

With such a diversified fleet of aircraft, engineers are bound to benefit and learn new skills, said vice-president of operations Teri Arychuk.

"We'll do whatever we can to help them benefit. When aircraft engineers gain new skills, we benefit as well," she said.

A large amount of responsibility comes with being a licensed aircraft engineer, Terry said.

All aircraft must be meticulously inspected before any flight goes to air and then checked again when the plane lands.

"We need to figure out why a plane is doing something, and fix it," he said.

Terry relishes in the role and he's always ready to pass along any knowledge he's gained to the 12 apprentices working at Air Tindi.

Most of the apprentices are doing similar work that I've done, Terry said. "Air Tindi can be a fun place to work. You know everybody you work with and it's a pretty family-oriented company."