Rachel Skirvin and Sarah Roark didn’t start their working lives in aviation, but made bold pivots once they found their passion.
Their journeys prove aviation can be a second career — even for those from entirely different fields.
And together, as the Felts Field Sky Queens, they’re gearing up for the 2025 Air Race Classic.
Rachel spent over a decade remotely managing critical access and rural healthcare facilities nationwide. But she found something was missing.
“I needed more than sitting behind a desk,” she recalls.
Like many people, COVID-19 allowed her the opportunity to reflect. From this reflection, she realized she wanted something bigger — not just for herself, but for her three kids.
“I wanted to inspire them and show them Mom can take a leap and be okay.”
During this period, Rachel found herself thinking of her Dad. He flies hang gliders and ultralights. The fun stuff. And that’s all Rachel thought aviation could be…fun. But after she took a discovery flight, she was instantly hooked. Today, she’s a flight instructor at Northwest Flight Service.
Sarah’s route to the cockpit was just as unconventional.
Armed with an undergraduate history degree and a master’s in library science, she started as a National Park Service archivist. While her undergraduate capstone project was about women in early aviation in Arizona, flying was something members of her family did, she said.
“I just wanted to be a librarian,” she added. “I love reading.”
That changed when she moved to Oregon and tried to get a job at the Evergreen Museum in McMinnville. They suggested she check across the street at Evergreen Helicopters.
“I convinced the director of airworthiness compliance my research and organizational skills would be an asset to the aircraft records analyst role,” she said.
From there, she worked her way through multiple aviation roles in multiple companies before landing in the cockpit of a Dassault Falcon 50 as a corporate pilot based in Oakland.
The journey
Like many student pilots, Rachel found aviation concepts difficult to internalize.
“For example, I struggled with density altitude, so I had to come up with a way to understand it. Now I teach it using penguins: When it’s cold, penguins huddle like air molecules. When it’s hot, they spread apart.”
Her quirky teaching style includes broad use of creative mnemonics and visualization.
Rachel earned her advanced ground instructor rating prior to becoming a CFI — something she believes all would-be CFIs would benefit from.
“It pushed me out of my comfort zone, made me a better teacher, and prepared me for check rides,” she said.
Along the path to the Falcon 50 cockpit, Sarah worked for Alaska Airlines in the flight ops tech pubs department and flew on the side — about 700 flight hours in this period of life.
Eventually she was accepted into Alaska’s Horizon Pilot Development Program. But she elected to leave to focus on her ratings. And over the next nine months Sarah earned her commercial certificate and instrument and multi-engine ratings.
Eyes on the Future
Not long after the discovery flight that hooked her, Rachel found Life Flight.
While she loves instructing, “Life Flight aligns with my values — bringing healthcare to small communities.”
So, she’s aiming for her dream job — flying a Pilatus PC-12 for Life Flight. To qualify, she needs 2,500 hours and significant turbine time.
“I need to figure out what opportunities will get me there,” she said.
Sarah’s goal is clear — returning to Alaska Airlines, as a pilot this time.
“I really liked working for Alaska. My brother flies for them, and it’d let me live in Spokane or on the west side of Washington and be home more,” she said.
For now, she’s gaining experience as a corporate jet pilot.
2025 Air Race Classic
Rachel and Sarah met as board members of the Spokane chapter of the Washington Pilots Association. They haven’t flown together yet, but plan to as soon as schedules allow. They’ll fly a Cherokee 235 in the race.
The Air Race Classic starts in Fairhope, Alabama, on June 17 and ends in Spokane, Washington, on June 20.
“We are excited that we kind of get a little bit of a privilege of flying the course backwards down to the start,” noted Rachel.
Rachel and Sarah have come a long way in aviation in a few short years. On the way to their ultimate goals, they plan to have some fun on the journey.
