PEOPLE ALONG THE WAY
The flights made
the introductions.
The community was never one kind of person. Multi-million milers, airline people, tech people, business owners, retirees, families and friends kept crossing paths on the same unusual flights. Eventually the friendships existed independently of the flying.
WHERE IT STARTED
The inaugural crowd
First flights created a natural meeting place. The same faces appeared on aircraft entries into service, new destinations and unusual route launches — enough times that strangers became familiar.
Brian Won
We met around United's 737 MAX 8 entry into service in July 2021, both trying to document the first flight. Brian later became a recurring companion across inaugurals and other aviation adventures, and his photo archive overlaps heavily with mine.
The inaugural story →Warren Rieutort-Louis
A recurring presence across inaugural flights and community trips. Warren became one of the people who helped turn the group from familiar faces on flights into an actual social circle.
Scott Yep
A recurring member of the group, a frequent participant in the unusual trips, and one of the people who helped tell the 7 Hub Run story publicly.
Jay Etzenbach
A longtime friend in the group whose life outside aviation is very different from the flying obsession that brought everyone together.
Matt Kolodny & Gary Cojulun
Two recurring faces around inaugural flights, both with airline-industry backgrounds that connect the enthusiast side of the community with people who have also worked inside the industry.
Fazal Shariff
Fazal belongs squarely in the inaugural crowd. On the Ulaanbaatar–Tokyo inaugural, he managed to persuade the U.S. Ambassador to Mongolia to extend a state-dinner invitation to frequent-flyer friends who were also attending the inaugural — exactly the kind of improbable story this community seems to produce.
Yana Zainal
One of the United employees I most admire. I have seen Yana working several inaugurals in Australia and again in Ulaanbaatar. She is consistently warm, capable and deeply engaged with the people around these launches — the kind of employee who makes an inaugural feel genuinely special.
John Lam
A 3 Million Miler and former Meta employee — a good example of how the group brought together people with deep flying histories and completely different professional lives.
THE CIRCLE WIDENS
Friends, families and repeat travelers
Over time, the relationships stopped being tied to a single flight. People brought partners and parents. The group traveled together outside inaugural days. Aviation remained the common language, but it was no longer the only reason to gather.
Alain & Chantal Rieutort-Louis
Warren's parents became part of the broader travel circle too. That family dimension is part of what made the group feel less like a collection of frequent flyers and more like an actual social community.
My parents
Eventually even my own family became part of gatherings with people I had first met through flying — another sign that the relationships had moved beyond the airport.
At a recent gathering in Munich for Oktoberfest, that wider circle included Joe Striedl, Jay Etzenbach, Scott Yep, Alice Chan, my parents, Nikki Nepomuceno, Matt Piotrowski, Nisha Visweswaran and GeeYo Marasigan. We had another reason to meet, even without a first flight on the calendar.
The flights created the introductions. The clearest sign that the community had become something else was when everyone started gathering even when there was no inaugural to fly.
One recent example: a group gathering in Munich for Oktoberfest.THE COMMUNITY CREATES ITS OWN TRIPS
From showing up to organizing
Once the relationships were established, waiting for an airline to launch something interesting was no longer necessary. The community could create its own reasons to fly.