Airline Hangars Balanced Manpower Utilization: An Optimization Approach

Airlines on average spend 10%-15% of their total operating cost on aircraft maintenance checks. Many airlines conduct their light checks in-house. These checks are inherently very labor intensive. This study offers a mathematical model to help airlines with scheduling their in-house light maintenance checks to achieve a high and even utilization of manpower among all hangars. The model attempts to minimize the utilization imbalances by assigning light maintenance checks, during their feasible time-windows, to available and certified hangars on daily, weekly and monthly. It incorporates daily flight schedule, maintenance requirements for each fleet type, certification and availability of manpower at each hangar. Furthermore, the model highlights the utilization imbalances and thus provides some guidelines in terms of increasing/decreasing manpower capacities at each hangar. The model is applied to 3 US and 2 European airlines with encouraging results.