Canadian North’s Medve gets top aviation honour

Canadian North president Tracy Medve is the Air Transport Association of Canada’s newest honourary life member – a distinguished award in the country’s aviation industry. (PHOTO COURTESY CANADIAN NORTH)

Twenty-five years ago, Canadian North president Tracy Medve made the phone call that would change her life.

The Saskatchewan-based lawyer then decided she needed to try something new.

She placed a call to local Norcanair and soon made the leap to Canada’s aviation industry.

“It turned out to be a good career move,” Medve said.

“There’s a tendency to get hooked on the industry,” she added. “It’s challenging and you never know from day to day what you’ll be faced with.”

And she didn’t see it coming when her peers and colleagues gave her an aviation award earlier this month.

On Nov. 8, Medve was inducted as an honourary life member with the Air Transport Association of Canada. She’s the first woman to ever receive the honour.

The ATAC has awarded life memberships since 1976 to those who have contributed significantly to the improvement of Canada’s airline industry.

Since 1985, Medve has held senior airline management positions at Norcanair, Time Air, Canadian Partner and Canadian Regional Airlines.

She’s also a member of the Northern Air Transport Association Board and the University of British Columbia, Okanagan External Advisory Board.

Medve took the reins at Canadian North in 2007.

Since then, the airline’s fleet size has doubled from seven to 14 aircraft and the company has expanded its service into the Kitikmeot ad Qikiqtani regions while Canadian North keeps up in a growing northern market.

Logistics in the north make good business decisions critical, Medve said, in a region where more people travel per capita then elsewhere in the country.

And forging ahead as a woman in the top spot has been interesting at times, she said, although it has never stood in her way.

“It was probably helpful to have some with a professional degree into the industry, it meant some credibility,” Medve said. “But by and large, if I never had an issue about being a woman in the industry, no one else did either.”

That said, she’d like to see more women taking leading roles within Canadian airlines.

“[The award] is a nice milestone,” Medve said, “and hopefully it sends signal to other women in the industry that there is a place for them here.”

The Air Transport Association of Canada was formed in 1934 and represents approximately 200 member aviation operators and manufacturers.