China Airlines’ First All-Male Crew Flies To New York, Thanks To Rule Change

Once in a while, we’ll see airlines highlight the special ways that flights are crewed, whether it’s an all-female crew, all-black crew, mother-daughter pilot duo, etc. Well, Taiwan-based SkyTeam carrier China Airlines just had a milestone flight, and it was neither a coincidence, nor was it planned by the company.

China Airlines flight attendants planned their own crew roster

A vast majority of China Airlines flight attendants are female, and historically, the company has limited how many male flight attendants there can be per flight, with most flights having at most one or two flight male flight attendants. As a result, male flight attendants rarely worked together, and rarely got to know one another on trips.

However, the flight attendant union recently managed to get the company to change this policy, so that the decision of who is crewed on a flight is no longer dependent on gender. With this policy change in place, some male flight attendants decided to plan a special flight to commemorate this.

Back in August 2025, several male flight attendants with fairly high seniority decided to bid on the same flight, so that they’d have good odds of being assigned that trip. Trip bidding for flight attendants is complicated, and it considers seniority, among other factors. They all agreed that in the event that a female flight attendant with higher seniority bid on the trip, they’d all drop out, and bid on a different trip.

They decided to bid on a trip from Taipei (TPE) to New York (JFK). There was no significance to the date that they chose. The reason they decided on New York was because the crew hotel is conveniently located, and many of the flight attendants travel there frequently, so they could have a special trip together, and plan some fun activities.

They weren’t necessarily expecting this would be successful with the first try, but sure enough, it was! Derek Lin, one of the flight attendants, shared details of this trip on Instagram, and it looks like they had a great time.

As the flight attendant wrote on Instagram (translated to English);

“This is not only a small milestone, but also a hope that no matter what profession you are in, there will be no more gender frameworks and labels from the previous generation. In the future, these things can be so commonplace. Let’s use our small efforts to continue to move the awareness of equality forward, okay?”

Kudos to this crew, what a nice effort!

Obviously people face different kinds of discrimination in different careers, and I think it’s worth celebrating when those “barriers” are broken. Yes, usually policies negatively impact women rather than men, but this is an exception. In this case, the airline quite literally had a policy against having too many male flight attendants on the same flight, and the union was able to get that changed.

So as a one-time thing, I think this is a really lovely concept. And I think it’s all the cooler when you consider the fact that the company didn’t even have anything to do with the planning, but instead, the flight attendants took it upon themselves to plan this.

Bottom line

Until recently, China Airlines didn’t even allow too many male flight attendants to work on the same flight. The union finally managed to get the company to end that policy, so they decided to celebrate by planning an all-male trip. Their planning really was impressive, as they managed to bid on the same New York trip on the first try.

As a one-time thing, I think this is fantastic. In the future, hopefully gender won’t be a consideration in planning one way or another.

What do you make of this China Airlines all-male crew?