International Society of Women Airline Pilots
Inspire, Support, and Advocate
for female airline pilots
Tara Traynor is a Captain and Line Check Pilot on the 757/767 for United Airlines. She has been on the Board of Directors of the International Society of Women Airline Pilots since 2015 and has been in her current role as President since 2019. She has also served a the IFALPA liaison for ISA+21 since 2015.
Tara got her start in aviation as a Naval Aviator after graduating from the US Naval Academy with a BS in Physics. While on active duty, she flew jets on two aircraft carrier deployments and served as the first female Advanced Strike instructor who had been deployed on an aircraft carrier. After leaving active duty in 2001, Tara spent a short time at American Airlines before being furloughed. She flew C-9s in the Navy Reserves until her retirement in 2011. In 2005, she was hired by Continental Airlines where she served in several ALPA positions, including representing the Newark based Continental First Officers from 2008-2013, leaving office at the conclusion of merging the Continental and United Airlines Pilot groups. She has flown the 737, 757/767 and 777 as a First Officer prior to upgrading on the 757/767 in 2014. She has been a Line Check Pilot for over 4 years and a Quality Control Line Check Pilot for over 2 years now.
Uli Fay started out 4 years ago as the Membership Director andin 2022, transitioned to the Vice President position on the Board of Directors, overseeing various tasks.
Uli’s flying career started in 1993 as a United Airlines flight attendant. She then went to flight school in Orlando, Florida and was hired as a pilot by Republic Airways in 2006. She worked there for two years as a first officer on the EMB-145, upgraded to captain, and then later became a captain on the EMB-175. Since 2021, Uli has been flying as a captain on the A320/321 for Global Crossing Airlines. She is enjoying the whole new world!
McKenzie Krutsinger stumbled into the world of aviation when she was 16 years old. She earned my Private Pilot’s license on her 18th birthday and then continued on to school at Florida Institute of Technology. Here, she earned a scholarship to play softball for the Panthers while getting her degree in Aviation Management with Flight and a Minor in UAS. During school she participated in two Women’s Air Race Classics, WAI, and the 99s. She flight instructed at FIT before making her way to SkyWest Airlines where she flew the CRJ based out of Chicago O’Hare. In December 2021, McKenzie was hired at Delta Air Lines where she is currently a First Officer on the B-737 based in NYC serving as a Line Validation Pilot.
Getting more women and young girls involved in the industry has been a passion of hers since she first began in the aviation field. She realized she is here to help others and reach an arm out to help pull them up. She believes women cannot achieve their mission without the mindset of lending a hand to those behind them. She enjoys getting involved in mentorship wherever possible. She participated with the 99s PPLI formal mentor program and continues to help serve on the coordination team. She is also a mentor for an organization called Project Aviator and has been establishing the mentorship program here at ISA+21. Whenever meeting young ladies, CFIs, or other female regional pilots McKenzie is the the first to offer help and advice whenever she can.
McKenzie has been a member of ISA+21 since 2020 and was elected to the board in 2022. Since discovering ISA+21 at a Women In Aviation Conference, she has become passionate about being involved in this organization whenever possible. As a Board Member, she aims to continue to help grow this organization, its membership, and to continue the legacy and honor those who came before us, and paving the way for those behind us.
G’Day! Chrissy Beattie was born and raised in Australia and is now am living on a ranch in Montana with her husband and spaniel puppy.
Chrissy’s aviation journey started out after her late father passed away from Pancreatic cancer December 2008. He was a Test Pilot for the Australian Airforce and went to Empire Test Pilot School, then Qantas. His success and career has been her inspiration and has driven her to get to where she is today. He always told her that she could be anything she wanted to be, as long as she put her mind to it.
After high school, she studied I.T. and landed a role at a private hospital writing code for a cardiovascular program. When her father died, she wanted to feel closer to him so she booked a trial flight. Upon taking off, she immediately knew becoming a pilot had to be in her future. She worked multiple jobs at a time, (hospitality, A320/21 cabin crew, Aviator Magazine writer, etc.) to fund her aviation career. She was awarded a scholarship through the ‘Australian Women in Aviation program’ which helped her get my Private Pilots License. From there, she flew multiple trips around Australia, around two weeks at a time, exploring the outback and remote places to build up hours and experience until she got accepted into her Aviation Degree where she completed her Commercial Pilots License and Bachelor in Aviation.
Her first job was in outback Central Australia- Ayers Rock, as the Deputy Chief Pilot for a small scenic/charter company. After 4 years, she moved to New Zealand for a similar role. A year later, she found SkyWest as her next venture and landed in the USA, in June 2018. She was on the ERJ-175 and upgraded to Captain in 2021.
After attending the ISA+21 Atlanta Conference in 2021, she met the hiring team which led to her getting a job with United Airlines as a First Officer on the B-737! She has since been hired at the United training department, teaching sim on the B-737 and still flying a few days a month.
One of her side hobbies is home construction. She runs a little side business in Montana renovating houses and rebuilding decks, doing all the construction by herself. She loves hunting and fishing and exploring the world. Her husband Mark is an outfitter and also runs the outdoors portion of the working ranch they live on. With hunting and fishing being his profession, it’s a huge part of their lives.
Having received a female pilot scholarship as a struggling young girl, then getting my dream job at United as a result of attending an ISA+21 event, she holds these organizations close to her heart and knows how lifechanging a little help can be.
As a little girl, Natasha’s first flight was on a TU-154 in 1980 from her hometown of Magadan to Moscow. Although she fell in love with flying, she knew she could have never achieved her goal of becoming an airline pilot in the Soviet Union. She is forever grateful that her mother immigrated her family to the United States where she discovered that girls CAN and DO become pilots!
When she arrived to the USA as a teenager, Natasha did not speak English and had the responsibility of taking care of her seriously ill mother. Life was extremely difficult. She overloaded on ESL (English as a Second Language) classes in high school and worked three jobs to take care of her mother. She received an academic scholarship to the University of Washington and followed a pre-med path until she met someone who claimed that he was going to become an airline pilot. That piqued Natasha’s interest in general aviation and, with her mentor’s gift of a discovery flight, reignited the “sleeping flying bug” of her childhood.
Natasha transferred to Embry-Riddle to pursue a degree in aviation and after graduating, she flight instructed to build time. In 1999, she was hired at American Eagle Airlines and flew the ATR-72 in the Caribbean islands chain before transferring to the E-145 for the next fifteen years. In 2016, she finally reached her dream of becoming a First Officer for American Airlines, where she currently flies the A320 out of DFW.
Natasha has been an ISA+21 member since 2013, has assisted the scholarship program since 2018, and has served as the Scholarship Director since 2020. Since then, she helped establish the Francesca Norris Memorial Scholarship, created opportunities for co-sponsoring scholarships with flight schools and airlines, established working relationships with universities and colleges with flight training programs, and streamlined the scholarship application package and selection process. Through the scholarship program ISA+21 is changing the lives of women around the world and propelling them into the major airlines’ flight decks. Natasha pledges to continue working tirelessly to assist as many women as she can to achieve their dreams of becoming airline pilots.
Erin has been honored to serve on the ISA+21 Board of Directors as the Communications Director for the past 4 years. She composes the News blasts that go out to ISA+21 members, the scholarship blasts for Aspiring members, and the informational blasts for Support members. She also builds and runs the content on all four of ISA+21’s public-facing social media platforms with the help of an amazing comms team. Another duty that Erin has had the honor of fulfilling is interviewing with many media personnel all over the world, and multiple doctorate candidates at various universities regarding the low percentage of female airline pilots.
Erin is a newly minted B-737 captain for American Airlines, and also a mom of 5 awesome kiddos.. three in college, one in the United States Army Band, and one in high school. She also has two wonderful step-sons, one of which is a pilot for Mesa Airlines. Her husband, Rob, is a B-737 check pilot for United Airlines, and also a Support member of ISA+21.
In November 2023, Therese retired after 15 years, 10 months, 2 weeks and 3 days (but who’s counting?) from the best job in her life at Delta Air Lines. The last airplane she flew there was the A320, where she sat left seat for 2 1/2 years based in LAX. Prior to that, she flew the B-757/767, B- 737, MD88/90, CRJ, and the EMB120. Prior to Delta, she was at SkyWest Airlines for 7.5 years, and before that, spent 5 very long years as an impoverished CFI eating ramen while building flight time at SNA.
Therese has been a member of ISA+21 since 2019, has attended two international conferences, Dublin and Anchorage, and has had an absolute blast getting to know many of the terrific ISA+21 members.
Christina Halli is a longtime member of ISA+21. She has been a Delta Air Lines pilot for 33 years and currently flies the A350 out of Detroit. She has flown most of the aircraft in Delta’s fleet and been based at most of their bases. Before Delta, she flew the C-21 Learjet and KC-135A Stratotanker in the U.S. Air Force.
She lives in Erie, PA with her husband of 29 years, who is not a pilot. She met him when she was furloughed in the ‘90s. They have two adult children, a three-year-old granddaughter, and a redbone coonhound. When she is not flying, she spends time with family and friends.
Christina is passionate about supporting women airline pilots because she started her career in the airlines when there were so few of women. In a word, it was lonely! She has spent much of her career trying to make the industry better for women and is proud of the progress women have made. She finds it so fun to fly with and/or continue to connect with other women pilots!
Serving on the ISA+21 BOD is a logical next step for Christina to give back in her pursuit to help other women pilots.
Ella has loved serving ISA+21 for the past two years as a volunteer for ISA+21’s social media platforms under the direction of Communications Director, Erin Jackson. Ella has helped multiple board members with various projects over the years by using social media to create and distribute information for ISA+21. Her knowledge of content strategy and creation, video editing, and brand management, will no doubt help elevate ISA+21 as one of the premier aviation organizations.
As for flying, Ella is currently a First Officer for Delta on the A330 out of JFK. Before that, she flew for Envoy Air and was also a flight instructor at Middle Tennessee State University. She currently lives in Nashville, Tennessee and has a crazy pup named Nova. She is always on the go, seeking out new adventures, attending live music events, or snowboarding in the winter with the Delta Ski team!