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WASHINGTON — Roughly a quarter of the nation's 637,000 aerospace workers could be eligible for retirement this year, raising fears that America could be facing a serious skills shortage in the factories that churn out commercial and military aircraft.

"It's a looming issue that's getting more serious year by year," said Marion Blakey, the president and chief executive of the Aerospace Industries Association. "These are real veterans. It's a hard workforce to replace."

The association, which represents aircraft manufacturers and suppliers, has designated the potential skills drain as one of its top 10 priorities in this year's presidential race. One of the major unions that represent aerospace workers also is embracing the issue in a rare alliance between labor and management.

"It's not a problem that's coming," said Frank Larkin, the spokesman for the 720,000-member International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers. "It's here."

The issue particularly resonates in aircraft-manufacturing centers such as the Dallas-Fort Worth area, the St. Louis metropolitan area, the Puget Sound region in Washington state, and Wichita, Kan., which bills itself as the "Air Capital of the World."

In Wichita, which has five major aircraft plants and hundreds of suppliers and vendors, community leaders are pursuing measures to offset the potential loss of more than 40 percent of the aeronautics workforce over the next five years. One initiative calls for the creation of a world-class aviation-training center to help meet the need for an additional 12,000 aerospace workers by 2018.

The impact varies by community. The Seattle-Tacoma area appears to be bucking the trend through a production surge at Boeing plants that has expanded the workforce with new hires from across the generational spectrum, including a growing number of workers between the ages of 18 and 29.

But nationally, the aerospace workforce is graying as the baby boom generation prepares to retire.

Many eligible for retirement

Ten years ago, the industry's largest age group was 35 to 44. Last year nearly 60 percent of the workforce was 45 or older. At least 20 percent were between the ages of 55 and 64, and many, if not most, already were eligible for retirement, according to the Aerospace Industries Association. An additional 2 percent — or 12,203 employees — were 65 or older.

The problem is essentially one of supply and demand.

Both the commercial and military segments of the industry are enjoying robust growth, with sales expected to increase by $12 billion this year. The demand for workers in the aerospace, electrical, mechanical and computer engineering disciplines this year is expected to be double what it was 10 years ago.

But analysts and corporate bosses say that colleges and universities are turning out far too few engineering and aeronautical graduates to fill future vacancies.

Public schools' poor record of teaching math and science is another worry. And as the boomers aged, the birthrate declined, resulting in a diminished pool of replacements.

Harry Holzer, a Georgetown University professor who served as the chief economist for the Labor Department, said the problem ultimately might be resolved by market forces. But for the moment, he said, "it won't be painless, and some real adjustments may have to occur."