United Airlines - N211UA
United 300 departs for Honolulu, using a domestic two-class 777. United has six of these domestic two-class 777s (designated XA) that used to fly between hubs and to Hawaii; after the Continental merger, these aircraft are also used on Honolulu-Guam and Guam-Japan flights, replacing Continental Micronesia's four Boeing 767-400ERs, which are now in mainline international service for the New United.
Visiting San Francisco on a Pride weekend that is also seeing the restoration of marriage rights for California's same-sex couples, I included some planespotting while at it. After all, San Francisco International Airport is the Pacific gateway for staunchly LGBT-friendly United Airlines, not to mention the home hub for just-as-staunchly-LGBT-friendly Virgin America.
It is worth remembering that Hawaii was the first state that attempted to extend marriage rights to same-sex couples in 1996. Cultural conservatives, alarmed by that move, responded by passing the federal Defense of Marriage Act, banning federal recognition of same-sex marriages, as a preemptive measure. While that portion of Defense of Marriage Act is dead, the other portion, which allows individual states to deny recognition of out-of-state same-sex marriages, remains on the books for now.
"Fly the Lesbian-Friendly Skies"
N211UA
Boeing 777-222 (XA)
Construction Number: 30217
Line Number: 282
First Flight: 4 May 2000
Delivery: 18 May 2000, United Airlines