I began roasting coffee in 2015 around the same time as I began my flight training. At the time, I didn’t have much of a budget to purchase a coffee roaster since all my funds I had in high school went towards flight training. But I knew I wanted to begin roasting and budgetary constraints were not going to stop me. I decided to purchase the most basic kind of fluid-bed roaster – a popcorn popper for $20 from my local hardware store. Instead of popping popcorn kernels, I roasted coffee beans. It was revolutionary for 15-year-old me at that time.

I continued to hone in on roasting and eventually, after graduating my college flying program during the pandemic, I moved up to CNY3 where I worked as an apprentice aircraft mechanic turning wrenches, acting as a shop hand, and roasting coffee in the hangar. I continued to do this during the aviation industry’s lull and the smell of freshly roasted coffee began to permeate the air surrounding the airport. Eventually garnering attention which led to me brewing coffee for everyone at the airport. Then one day I trialed selling a few bags, and from there it kind of took off.

I roasted in Hangar 22 so that’s where I got the name. I eventually continued on in my aviation career and became a corporate pilot on the G150 and am now a 737 pilot for a Canadian airline. I moonlight as a coffee roaster and barista to help fill the void for specialty coffee done right within aviation and get to fly jets around North America while doing it.

- Thomas Varep-Popov

 

 

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Follow Thomas @flywithvp