“People think I walked into this,” she says, nursing a black coffee that has long gone cold. “My dad flew these same routes forty years ago, yeah. But he flew boxy haulers with no AI assist and a navigation system that ran on literal tape. I didn’t inherit the rank. I inherited the migraines.”
We caught up with her during a 36-hour layover at Arcturus Station, between a cargo haul to Titan and a passenger liner bound for the outer colonies. Andersen doesn’t look like a legacy pilot. She doesn’t wear a captain’s cap unless regulations require it, and her uniform jacket is often draped over her chair. She prefers a worn leather bomber jacket—her father’s, she notes. captain zoe andersen
As she walks toward the airlock, I ask her one last question: What advice do you have for the next Zoe Andersen? “People think I walked into this,” she says,