From Maui to New England

I grew up in Hawaii with no path to aviation. I built one anyway.

First intro flight at Kahului Airport, 2018

Where it Started

I took my first intro flight in a C172SP out of Kahului Airport in 2018. I knew right away what I wanted to do.

I didn't grow up around airplanes. Nobody in my family flew. I moved to New England and worked my way into a software engineering career because it was the only path I could see that would eventually let me afford flight training.

Private pilot checkride, RV-12 at Portsmouth International

First Solo - First Checkride

My first solo was in the RV-12 out of Portsmouth International in February 2024. That summer I passed my private checkride in 50 hours.

Flying the Cirrus SR20

Everything After

From there I earned my instrument rating, high-performance endorsement, AGI, IGI, and Part 107. I joined Skyhaven Flying Club and flew the Cessna 172 and Cirrus SR20 through every season New England has to offer.

Seaplane rating add-on

Seaplane, Commercial, & Beyond

I earned my single-engine sea add-on, then completed an accelerated commercial program at Laconia Flight Academy in 43 days. Now I'm finishing my CFI at CHI Aerospace in Portsmouth, NH, with plans to pursue the CFII after that.

Sharing a flight over New England

Why I Fly

Soon after I started taking passengers up over New England, I realized the best part of aviation isn't flying. It's showing someone else what it looks like from up there. That's when I decided to instruct.

Aviation is where I want to be. The tech background didn't go away — it just found a better flight deck.

The Tech Side

Now a flight simulator technician at Flight Sim Coach. Five years as a software engineer before that, including two at Jeppesen ForeFlight.

At Flight Sim Coach I provide remote support and instruction for pilots and enthusiasts running X-Plane 11 and 12. Before that, at ForeFlight, I built the content delivery system, contributed on the community events feature, and designed the server-side education video layer for the mobile app. Earlier I built data pipelines and mentored engineering teams at Arkatechture, and developed full-stack web applications at Frontdesk.

That background translates more than you'd expect. Documentation, standardization, training records, scheduling systems, managing technical complexity under pressure — I did all of that before I ever sat in the left seat. Now I bring it to the flight deck.

Night flight over New England

Outside the Flight Deck

I live in New Hampshire with my wife and our daughter. When I'm not flying I'm usually building something — I wrote the software that generated this website. I'm a member of AOPA, the Skyhaven Flying Club, and a subscriber to every aviation podcast I can find. Here's my 2025 ForeFlight Recap.