While Delta makes the flight from Salt Lake City to Houston every day, a trip earlier this week was different. In celebration of International Girls in Aviation Day, the Delta flight included 120 girls, who were 12 to 18 years old, traveling between the two cities.
The flight was run completely by women, with an all-female pilot and flight crew, female ramp agents, female gate agents and women in the control tower giving the pilot instructions, according to a statement released by Delta.
“We know representation matters. At Delta, we believe you have to see it to believe it,” said Beth Poole, general manager of pilot development. “We’re taking ownership to improve gender diversity by exposing girls at a young age and providing a pipeline so that 10 years from now, they will be the pilots in the Delta cockpit inspiring generations of women to follow.”
The event was organized in an effort to encourage young girls to enter the male-dominated field of aviation.
Upon arriving in Houston, the girls toured NASA’s Mission Control Center, the Johnson Space Center and Space Center Houston. The students also ate lunch with astronaut and aerospace engineer Jeanette Epps, according to CNN.
“It didn’t seem realistic to go after a career in aviation. But today I realized, ‘Hey, I can do this too,’” said 12th-grader Katelyn about her experience.
According to 2017 data from the Federal Aviation Administration’s Aeronautical Center, out of the 609,306 pilots in the U.S., about 7% are women. Delta said that 5% of its pilots were women and that 7.4% of pilots hired over the last four years were women.
To select participants in the event, Delta worked with Salt Lake City schools that have STEM or aviation programs, according to ABC News. Participants included students from Advanced Learning Center, Bryant Middle School, Granite Technical Institute, Jordan Technical Institute, Karl G. Maeser Preparatory Academy and the Salt Lake Center for Science Education.
International Girls in Aviation Day was a worldwide effort to celebrate girls in the air. Organizers have said that over 20,000 people celebrated the day in the United States, Canada and Australia, as well as in countries in Africa, Asia and Europe.