History Of Ultra-long-haul(ish) Flying

boswashsprstar · Tue Jun 05, 2012 6:18 pm

I was recently on a flight from the Middle East to New York, which I have occasionally heard referred to as a ULH route, and was thinking about how EK/EY/QR only started doing that route nonstop once they had A345s and 77Ls in service. However, it's not really that long of a trip--about 14 hours, similar to JFK-NRT. So, a few questions for my curiosity:

Did the Middle Eastern giants wait for the latest gen ULH aircraft because of the poor performance when taking off in desert temperatures? Or could the 744 have made the trip, but it just happens that those carriers never operated the 744?

How long have routes of around that length--say JFK-NRT and LAX-SYD--been operated nonstop? What was the first aircraft capable of those types of missions? I'm guessing the 742?

thegoldenargosy · Tue Jun 05, 2012 6:32 pm

I believe in 1975 or 1976 Pan Am started JFK-NRT & LAX-SYD on 747SP's. This was the first time these routes were operated nonstop. They also flew JFK-Dharan, Saudi Arabia, at one point.

lhcvg · Tue Jun 05, 2012 6:35 pm

The 747SP would be the first true ULH aircraft, and JFK-Tokyo was one of the routes it was designed for, so that would put that route at roughly 40 years old (just shy). Fun fact: according to Wikipedia, the SP sold 45 frames vs. 34 for the 345 and 57 for the 77L.

cargolex · Tue Jun 05, 2012 7:24 pm

The 747SP was definitely the first ULH-capable plane. The 747-400 and then the A340 eclipsed it, but from 1976 to 1989, it was more or less the only aircraft capable of what was then thought of as ULH. It isn't an ultra-long-haul aircraft compared to the 77L or A345, but at the time it could do missions no other aircraft could do.

The SP was used on a variety of ULH routes, mostly to Asia/Australia but also to the middle east. One reason Braniff got the SP was that they wanted to fly DFW-Bahrain, which might have been a profitable route if they'd been able to do it - though by the time the equipment was in place Braniff's situation was deteriorating quickly, so I don't think that happened. It's no coincidence though, that the only carriers who bought the SP were those who really needed them for distance or had routes where they thought they could use them profitably - Pan Am, CAAC, China Airlines, Qantas, SAA, etc., with only a few exceptions.

As for the Middle Eastern carriers...

EK/EY/QR were very young carriers when the 744 was new and didn't even exist when the SP was around - so it's natural that they would not have ordered these aircraft back in those days. By the time they'd grown large enough to justify flying nonstop between Abu Dhabi and New York, they had access to the A340-500 and 77L, or soon would, and the 744 wouldn't have made sense to acquire.

Two middle eastern carriers did buy them for passenger operations - Syrian and Iran Air. I don't know much about Syrian Air but Iran Air did (and does) use them long haul for many destinations including, before the revolution, JFK.

incitatus · Tue Jun 05, 2012 7:42 pm

Quoting boswashsprstar (Thread starter):
Did the Middle Eastern giants wait for the latest gen ULH aircraft

Just a note on the qualifier "giant".

Etihad is still small. The long-haul operation of Etihad, while growing, is still smaller than Virgin Atlantic. Virgin is quite under-endowed!

Qatar is middle-of-the-pack, still considerably smaller than Cathay or Singapore.

Emirates is giant and growing. But for comparison EK supplies about 400 million asms per day while United supplies 750 million asms per day. EK supplies about 140k seats per day and United 540k.

airzim · Tue Jun 05, 2012 8:35 pm

Quoting boswashsprstar (Thread starter):
Did the Middle Eastern giants wait for the latest gen ULH aircraft because of the poor performance when taking off in desert temperatures? Or could the 744 have made the trip, but it just happens that those carriers never operated the 744?

You have to remember Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Doha that we know today were essentially villages 30 years ago. These cities have exploded as a result of state directed investment, and partly driven by their respective national government desire to build carriers through aggressive expansion. Until recently, most of these countries made entry visas painful (much like Kuwait and Saudi today) If nothing else, these airports were primarily refueling stations before between Europe and SE Asia before the 744's hit the scene.

Even as short as 20 years ago, Gulf Air was the dominate airline in the region, QR was a back packer carrier flying 747's from LGW via DOH to KTM, EK had probabaly less than 20 planes, and Etihad didn't even exist.

Let's also keep in mind that the 747SP cost about as much to operate as a 742, but with 100 less seats. The plane was a killer on the balance sheet. Boeing killed itself on this plane with the 742B's. The 200B's performance satisfied many markets which the 747SP was designed to handle. I believe JFK-NRT and NRT-LHR come to mind.

Viscount724 · Tue Jun 05, 2012 8:51 pm

Quoting cargolex (Reply 3):
Two middle eastern carriers did buy them for passenger operations - Syrian and Iran Air. I don't know much about Syrian Air but Iran Air did (and does) use them long haul for many destinations including, before the revolution, JFK.

747SP nonstop services U.S.-Middle East included:

IR JFK-THR
SV JFK-JED
PA JFK-DHA

I don't think Syrianair ever used their SPs on routes that required the SP's range.

mozart · Tue Jun 05, 2012 8:53 pm

What I find interesting to observe is how companies like Emirates wait for ULH planes to be launched before flying nonstop to - for instance - the US East Coast. The first DXB-JFK flights were on the A345. Some flights also routed through Hamburg (not so long ago), also on the A345 IIRC. Today that route is flown by a "mere" B777-300ER, whilst the A345 are all used on much shorter routes. Probably EK's rationale is that routes for which the A345 was originally acquired can today be operated more economically with B77Ls and B77Ws, so they use the economic disadvantage of the A345 only on shorter routes. What surprises me though is why they don't get rid of their A345s altogether? Why keep them and fly them to Vienna and Beirut? Is their plane shortage so acute as to keep otherwise unattractive planes in the fleet?

The other carrier which first served the Gulf-USA route with a stop was Qatar, who stopped over in Geneva en route to Washington. And wasn't Etihad also stopping in Geneva en route to New York? All of this is about ten years ago or even less.

So the nonstop Gulf-USA flights is a very recent phenomenon, and even more recent are ULH flights from the Gulf to South America. Having said that Sao Paulo now sees all three (EK, QR, EY), Buenos Aires has two (EK, QR), and Emirates goes to Rio de Janeiro. There only spots left that have no nonstop connection to the Gulf region despite some sizeable international gateways are Northern Cone/Pacific Coast South America, Mexico/Central America, New Zealand and - although less important gateways in international aviation - Pacific islands like the Hawaii archipel or Polynesia.

seabosdca · Tue Jun 05, 2012 9:05 pm

Quoting mozart (Reply 7):
What surprises me though is why they don't get rid of their A345s altogether? Why keep them and fly them to Vienna and Beirut? Is their plane shortage so acute as to keep otherwise unattractive planes in the fleet?

It's more expensive to get rid of a plane with low resale value than it is to keep it flying in the most appropriate niche. EK has been using their A345s to handle routes that are short but super-premium. On these routes, the fuel burn disadvantage matters less, but the A345's ability to lift very heavy premium hard products is still a big advantage. This also gives them the flexibility to use the A345 on long-haul when it fits the schedule best.

Viscount724 · Tue Jun 05, 2012 9:18 pm

Quoting mozart (Reply 7):
So the nonstop Gulf-USA flights is a very recent phenomenon,

Don't you consider Saudi Arabia and Iran as the "Gulf"? As mentioned in an earlier reply, 747SPs were operating nonstop JFK-THR (IR), JFK-JED (SV) and JFK-DHA(PA) in the late 1970s, about 35 years ago.

airzim · Tue Jun 05, 2012 10:07 pm

Quoting mozart (Reply 7):
So the nonstop Gulf-USA flights is a very recent phenomenon,

Gulf Air flew BAH-JFK-IAH, there was also a stop in LCA at one point (there may always have been) about 15 years ago.

KU has also flown JFK-KWI starting in 1978

deltacto · Tue Jun 05, 2012 10:36 pm

As recently as 2007 Iran Air flew Tehran-Damascus-Caracas with a 747SP

Iran Air To Caracas - We Did It! (by Airevents Mar 31 2007 in Civil Aviation)

pilotanthony · Tue Jun 05, 2012 11:15 pm

Longest flight i have been on is LHR-SEA took about 10 hours with Northwest Airlines on an A330-200!

ktachiya · Wed Jun 06, 2012 3:51 am

Quoting airzim (Reply 5):
he 200B's performance satisfied many markets which the 747SP was designed to handle

I heard that until enhanced engines for the B747-200B came out, the 747SP was the only aircraft capable of flying JFK-NRT. Until JAL acquired the 200B with the JT9D-7R4G2 engines (the engines carried on their vanished B747-300 fleet), JAL flew to JFK via a tech-stop in ANC with a DC-10-40.

BLRAviation · Wed Jun 06, 2012 5:50 am

Still remember the AA 747SP flights DFW-NRT. Huge business class and minuscule coach class (by normal 747 standards of those days).

If one has to talk about ULH services, we cannot overlook the SIN-EWR, SIN-LAX, and BKK-LAX operated by SQ and TG. All these flights use the A345 and I have used to be a regular on them.

I still remember the inaugural return flight LAX-SIN. The flight was 4 hours early in to LAX due to tail winds, and there was concern whether the 18 hour return flight would turn in to a 22 hour one, which of course, would necessitate a re-fuelling stop. So the captain decided to take an equatorial route from LAX over Hawaii, Philippines, and on to Singapore. A massive 170 tons of fuel. 20 hours later we all breathed a sigh of relief when we landed in Singapore, non-stop.

Singapore Airlines had all their cockpit crew connected up measuring brain waves etc., since they really did not have definitive data on the effects these ULH flights had on the human body and by extension their flight crew.

The SIN-EWR flight is about 20 hours in each direction and both legs are flown eastbound due to winds. Regularly goes very close to the north pole. Eerie to see out of the window. Its a night purple sky and all you can see is the huge swathe of white on the ground.

But by and large the A345 is a failure. Apart from the killer fuel costs, even EK flies it DXB-MEL where they do not have too much load, rather than for the distance. Also, Boeing has improved the 777-300ER to the point EK can cover most points in the globe with this aircraft.

triple7man · Wed Jun 06, 2012 6:37 am

The 747SP was the first airplane that could fly the ultra long haul routes. The reason it is shorter was to make it lighter, where it could fly higher and burn less fuel, giving it the range. Before the 747SP if you wanted to fly JFK-NRT you would need to fly by way of LAX or SFO. And if there were heavy headwinds, a fuel stop at ANC was required. The 747-200 had the range to fly LAX-NRT but it was getting close to it's limits. The 747-400 changed all that when it came out in 1988. It had the range of the SP plus the space. The 777-300ER and 777-200LR can fly even further.
AA flew the 747SP DFW-NRT and later replaced it with the MD-11, which had a lot of mixed reviews. With the purchase of the 777-200ER, AA can fly JFK/DFW/ORD/LAX-NRT easily.

xdlx · Wed Jun 06, 2012 8:31 am

Quoting BLRAviation (Reply 14):

Not mentioned here... but a true ULH rote was MIA-JNB on SP and then 742B.... still a ULH by many stds.

DIRECTFLT · Wed Jun 06, 2012 8:54 am

I remember seeing the AA 747SP at DFW. It was a site to behold. Like a Space-Age plane, in it's appearance.

I flew on the MD-11, within the US, and I was not impressed with it.

I've never been on a 747, but I'd like to, just to have done it.

But honestly, any flight over 10 hours, and I'm ready to land and lesiurely walk around for awhile, before the next leg of along trip, assuming I won't have to change terminals, or go through customs hell, like at Miami, where you walk for what seems forever to get to customs, and then make that same long walk back to about where you got off the plane.

flyingturtle · Wed Jun 06, 2012 9:33 am

Curiously, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-stop_flight hasn't been mentioned yet. I suppose everybody knowledgeable on this topic has already contributed to this wikipedia page.

Going way back into history and away from commercial aviation, I'm reminded of the World War I bombers who already had ranges of 7 to 10 hours... they didn't come far at 73 knots.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeppelin-Staaken_R.VI

The Focke-Wulf 200 "Condor":

Quote:
The Fw 200 was the first heavier-than-air craft to fly nonstop between Berlin and New York City, making the journey on 10 August 1938 in 24 hours and 56 minutes. The return trip on 13 August 1938 took 19 hours and 47 minutes.

But in revenue service, it carried 30 passengers 810 nm... is this still ULH, considering the state of airplane engineering then?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Focke-Wulf_Fw_200

David

trent1000 · Wed Jun 06, 2012 12:25 pm

I knew someone who flew SYD/KUL/LHR in 1976 on what was then Malaysia-Air System. This was probably on one of their new DC10s. Back then, KUL to LHR non-stop was a big deal & certainly long haul (probably seemed ultra haul).

I didn't realise that MAS didn't get their first 747 until as late as 1989!

But then...in 1997, Malaysian Airlines flew the world's longest non-commercial, non-stop flight from Boeing Field in Seattle to Kuala Lumpur, flying eastward passing the European and African continents and breaking the Great Circle Distance Without Landing record for an airliner on a Boeing 777-200ER; this record is now held by the Boeing 777-200LR.
http://www.jctrans.net/Content/tool/plane/MalaysiaAir.htm

blink182 · Wed Jun 06, 2012 1:18 pm

A little surprised JFK-TLV hasn't come up yet; these two cities have been connected since the forties, initially by TW, I believe. I don't know when the route went nonstop and can't seem to dig any information up, but I'm fairly confident that this is a prime example of ULH in its early days.

jfk777 · Wed Jun 06, 2012 1:22 pm

Quoting trent1000 (Reply 19):
I knew someone who flew SYD/KUL/LHR in 1976 on what was then Malaysia-Air System. This was probably on one of their new DC10s. Back then, KUL to LHR non-stop was a big deal & certainly long haul (probably seemed ultra haul).

MAS DC-10-30 flew to LHR with a stop in Bahrain or Dubai, not Nonstop. SYD to LHR was a 2 stop thing back then.

Quoting trent1000 (Reply 19):
I didn't realise that MAS didn't get their first 747 until as late as 1989!

Malaysia has 742's flying to Europe from the early 1980's. in 1989 they got 744 which they are still flying to Europe and soon LHR will see only A380's for MAS.

BLRAviation · Wed Jun 06, 2012 6:41 pm

Another flight, which I do not know if it constitutes as ultra long haul, is CX HKG-JFK service. At 16 hours 8068 miles it is another seriously long haul flight if not a ULH.

Quoting xdlx (Reply 16):
Not mentioned here... but a true ULH rote was MIA-JNB on SP and then 742B.... still a ULH by many stds.

Which airline operated this flight?

Quoting triple7man (Reply 15):
With the purchase of the 777-200ER, AA can fly JFK/DFW/ORD/LAX-NRT easily.

Despite having lived in the US for over 20 years, I have always been surprised with the US fixation on the 777-200ER. While most carriers in the rest of the world has moved on to the 777-300ER (77W) there was so much hoopla recently when AA became the first carrier to buy the 77W. Not that I mind it, just was surprised since Emirates is right at 100 passenger 777s (may be 101) in their fleet 69 or 70 of them being 77Ws. But I am truly surprised how people withstand such long flight in the 10 abreast pathetic 17 inch wide seats of EK and EY economy class. By comparison 9 abreast are QR, SQ at 19 inch AI and 9W at 18.5. BA is 9 abreast but only 17.5 inches.

DocLightning · Wed Jun 06, 2012 7:00 pm

Quoting pilotanthony (Reply 12):
Longest flight i have been on is LHR-SEA took about 10 hours with Northwest Airlines on an A330-200!

And you raise a good point. While there are certainly longer flights, the average citizen of the world, even the average frequent flyer, is unlikely to ever take a flight longer than about 14-15 hours and even those are very rare for most people. The vast majority of "long-haul" flights are in the range of 8-12 hours in length. Longest flights I've ever taken were DTW-OSA and SFO-SYD, both on 744's. But the majority of 744's in the world are flying shorter flights of 7-10 hours' duration.

There is a lot more to an airliner than its maximum range, since most airliners will never be used at their maximum range.

airzim · Wed Jun 06, 2012 7:58 pm

Quoting BLRAviation (Reply 22):
Which airline operated this flight?

South African. However I think the correct routing was JNB-CPT-MIA. The 744 is more capable than the SP so I doubt the SP went JNB-MIA nonstop. Maybe I'm wrong.

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Photo © Toni Marimon

I did MIA-CPT-JNB on a 744 around 2000. After SA switched from AA to DL they shifted to JNB-CPT-FLL,

then JNB-CPT-ATL,

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Photo © Daniel Piotrowski

then JNB-CPT-IAD with the link to United, although by then they may have dropped the CPT stop.

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Photo © Daniel Wojdylo

Years and years ago, IAH was a tag off MIA.

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Photo © Dean Straw

The South African SP was also helpful during Apartheid sanctions to hook around the African bulge on flights to Europe, since SA did not have overflight ability, much the same way LY needs to do goofy routings to fly East from TLV.

Prinair · Wed Jun 06, 2012 8:25 pm

I don't believe IAH service on SA was a tag-on to MIA service. SA flew IAH-GIG-CPT-JNB

eta unknown · Wed Jun 06, 2012 10:25 pm

It was JNB-SID-IAH & JNB-SID-JFK.

The Syrian SP's were always a curious buy- they never went any further west than LHR, and the easternmost point was BOM/DEL. They may have been bought as some part of a grand plan that never eventuated to fly to Brazil to cater to the Lebanese expat population there during the war as DAM-BEY by road was often easier than arriving by air.

GF was the carrier that flew to North America via LCA or GVA (no traffic rights GVA-USA).

SV also flew JFK-DHA nonstop.

Add KU to the list: JFK-KWI nonstop (A340 or 772) long before EK/EY/QR. Westbound about 20 seats blocked off for weight restrictions.

PA SYD-LAX with the SP also had great weight restrictions (the original routing was SFO-AKL-SYD) and only the rear cabin was economy. UA found out the hard way about operational performance when they purchased the Pacific routes.

deltacto · Wed Jun 06, 2012 10:41 pm

Quoting BLRAviation (Reply 14):
Still remember the AA 747SP flights DFW-NRT. Huge business class and minuscule coach class (by normal 747 standards of those days).

AA had just 78 seats in coach

http://boardingarea.com/blogs/freque...ap-american-airlines-boeing-747sp/

Viscount724 · Wed Jun 06, 2012 10:54 pm

Quoting deltacto (Reply 27):
Quoting BLRAviation (Reply 14):
Still remember the AA 747SP flights DFW-NRT. Huge business class and minuscule coach class (by normal 747 standards of those days).

AA had just 78 seats in coach

Pan Am was similar with only 86 seats in Y class on their 747SPs (47 F, 100 J, 86 Y). I think UA retained that configuration when they took over Pan Am's SPs after the Pacific route purchase in 1986.

Newark727 · Thu Jun 07, 2012 12:47 am

It's been touched on already, but I'm curious about the performance of the 747SP versus the 747-200B. Could the 747-200 do transpacific at launch or was it later in production? About when did the -200B get close enough to the SP to make the latter redundant?

Thanks!

eta unknown · Fri Jun 08, 2012 1:37 am

Quoting Viscount724 (Reply 28):
Pan Am was similar with only 86 seats in Y class on their 747SPs (47 F, 100 J, 86 Y). I think UA retained that configuration when they took over Pan Am's SPs after the Pacific route purchase in 1986.

Correct. And on SYD-LAX even eastbound they had to make frequent HNL fuel stops.

BLRAviation · Fri Jun 08, 2012 12:15 pm

Quoting Viscount724 (Reply 28):
Pan Am was similar with only 86 seats in Y class on their 747SPs (47 F, 100 J, 86 Y). I think UA retained that configuration when they took over Pan Am's SPs after the Pacific route purchase in 1986.

Were the two SPs that AA used from Pan Am also? I thought someone at AA told me that, but sorry I forget.

jfk777 · Fri Jun 08, 2012 1:42 pm

Quoting BLRAviation (Reply 14):
If one has to talk about ULH services, we cannot overlook the SIN-EWR, SIN-LAX, and BKK-LAX operated by SQ and TG. All these flights use the A345 and I have used to be a regular on them

The concept of a ULH flight is one that has expanded since the 747SP first did JFK to NRT in the 1970, then that was ULH now its NOT. LAX to SYD and HKG were ULH but are not today ULH. LAX to Dubai is ULH. Today a New York flight to be ULH it would have to go east of India and west of HKG, A345 flights are ULH. LAX to Sinagpore and Bangkok are ULH. 15 hours or more would define ULH today.

Quoting xdlx (Reply 16):
Not mentioned here... but a true ULH rote was MIA-JNB on SP and then 742B.... still a ULH by many stds.

SAA flew nonstop with 744 from Miami to Capetown to JNB. 7700 miles nonstop each way.

Quoting Prinair (Reply 25):
Prinair From United States of America, joined Dec 1999, 744 posts, RR: 3Reply 25, posted Wed Jun 6 2012 10:25:00 your local time (1 day 17 hours 9 minutes ago) and read 1473 times:I don't believe IAH service on SA was a tag-on to MIA service. SA flew IAH-GIG-CPT-JNB

SAA flew toHouston once a week at the time via Cape Verde Islands. Never flew to Miami until 1993.

Quoting BLRAviation (Reply 31):
Were the two SPs that AA used from Pan Am also? I thought someone at AA told me that, but sorry I forget.

The 2 AA 747SP were from TWA in 1987 prior to AA buying the LHR routes from TWA in 1991.

CO787EWR · Fri Jun 08, 2012 2:01 pm

Quoting jfk777 (Reply 32):

The concept of a ULH flight is one that has expanded since the 747SP first did JFK to NRT in the 1970, then that was ULH now its NOT. LAX to SYD and HKG were ULH but are not today ULH. LAX to Dubai is ULH. Today a New York flight to be ULH it would have to go east of India and west of HKG, A345 flights are ULH. LAX to Sinagpore and Bangkok are ULH. 15 hours or more would define ULH today.

So roughly 6600nm+ is considered ULH in your opinion?

seabosdca · Fri Jun 08, 2012 2:15 pm

Quoting jfk777 (Reply 32):
LAX to SYD and HKG were ULH but are not today ULH. LAX to Dubai is ULH. Today a New York flight to be ULH it would have to go east of India and west of HKG, A345 flights are ULH.

It's very subjective. But ULH definitely means something different today than it would have in the days when the 747SP was the thing for the longest routes. (Just to give some perspective, a HGW A330-200 can fly farther than the SP could.)

My opinion is just a bit more inclusive than jfk777's. I think LAX-SYD still barely qualifies as ULH, although LAX-AKL and LAX-HKG don't. My very subjective definition would be "a route that can give a 744 trouble at least occasionally." That is about 14 1/2 hours and up, and depending on winds it could be anywhere over 6500 nm.

CZ346 · Fri Jun 08, 2012 2:50 pm

Quoting BLRAviation (Reply 22):

If this ones not considered ULH I'd like to submit a complaint.

I do close to 250,000 miles a year with UA and don't have a single leg in the past year thats less than 10 hours. I typically classify things 3-8 hours as medium haul, 10-15 as long haul and legs 15 hours+ as an ultra long haul, so UA117/116 (EWR-HKG) is pretty much the shortest leg I'd consider a ULH.

B777LRF · Fri Jun 08, 2012 2:57 pm

There is no set definition for what constitutes ULH, of even LH, MH or SH. One is therefore, more or less, free to set the parameters, which in my case is as follows. It's based on flying at roughly 450KTS.

- 1350NM / 3 hours: Short-haul
1350 - 2700NM / 3-6 hours: Medium-haul
2700 - 6500NM / 7 - 14 hours: Long-haul
6500NM / 14 hours+: Ultra Long-haul

The deciding factor being distance, not time. So if you've done 6501NM in 13.9 hours, it's ULH. But if it took you 14.1 hours to do 6499NM it's still "only" long-haul.

BLRAviation · Fri Jun 08, 2012 3:06 pm

Quoting CZ346 (Reply 35):
I do close to 250,000 miles a year with UA and don't have a single leg in the past year thats less than 10 hours. I typically classify things 3-8 hours as medium haul, 10-15 as long haul and legs 15 hours+ as an ultra long haul, so UA117/116 (EWR-HKG) is pretty much the shortest leg I'd consider a ULH.

You remind me of myself back in the mid 90's to early 2000's. Very similar, 250K~350K per year, except my airline was SQ, and SIN-LAX, SIN-EWR were common flights. After about 4 million miles over the last 20 years, I finally cracked up and have cut back to about 100K. Now trying to achieve 50K goal.

I fully support your assessment. Any flight more than 15~16 hours would be ULH category. AI does operate BOM-JFK but I have never flown it so I do not know the flight times. SIN-LHR is 14 hours.

RobertS975 · Fri Jun 08, 2012 3:07 pm

SAA bought the 747SP in part because it was capable of flying certain routes without refueling, and at one point, political issues resulting from apartheid policies prevented it from refueling in many locations on the African continent. The airport at Sal, Cape Verde Islands (SID) became a popular technical stop for SAA flights to/from Europe and the United States.

jfk777 · Fri Jun 08, 2012 4:30 pm

Quoting RobertS975 (Reply 38):
SAA bought the 747SP in part because it was capable of flying certain routes without refueling, and at one point, political issues resulting from apartheid policies prevented it from refueling in many locations on the African continent. The airport at Sal, Cape Verde Islands (SID) became a popular technical stop for SAA flights to/from Europe and the United States.

SAA also had to fly around Africa to Europe not over it, when Aparteid ended its flights to LHR from JNB suddenly became a little over 1 hour shorter. SAA flew to Tel Aviv via Lisbon, Portugal and east over the Meditterean. The Indian Ocean was kinder since the African Continent didn't cause much of a detour for SAA's Hong Kong flights. SAA purchased those 747SP for economic survival not because they would operate profitably. SAA 747 capatins as a group were probably the most talented group of 747 pilots in the world, who else had so many obsticles and long distances to fly.

Qantas pilots, another very talented 747 goup, had Honolulu and Singapore to land in on their journies to Los Angeles and London.

baje427 · Fri Jun 08, 2012 4:44 pm

In the days before the A340, 777,744 etc what would have been some of the longest routes flown by the DC10, L1011, and 747 sp,200 and 300?

CZ346 · Sat Jun 09, 2012 9:23 am

Quoting BLRAviation (Reply 37):

Haha - It didn't take me too long to get horribly sick of it. I'm from NYC, I live in China, and at any given month bounce between HKG, EWR and GRU. I'm back in China now, 3 days ago I was in NYC, and 2 days before that I was in South America. From EWR-HKG in the front we had a wonderful steak dinner that gave us all what I'm pretty convinced now to be food poisoning. Immigration took me 3 hours because I had to keep making an escape from the line to the bathroom and starting the line over.

Back on track - I think this whole "ULH" initiation in regards to what commercial aviation has become needs to get an overhaul. I never noticed this before I began traveling like I did these past couple years but theres a VERY fine line between the way a 13 hour flight affects you and a 15-20 affects you. Back when we were looking at flights this long in the 70's and 80's it was a different class of flying. I guess I just wish more airlines would jump on board with this "Suite" thing that EK and SQ have began, because for people like myself who do 24 hour trips halfway around the world it would provide a good solution to the lack of a bed. I'm used to paying $10k and I'd pay $18k for it in a heartbeat and I know a lot of other people who would too. Also - with this new boom in ULH, how about giving us 250-300k a year FF's a reason to stick to one airline? I get the highest level on DL and UA every year without fail. This year I'm GS with UA, but I didn't know how to obtain it. If the pax who are flying this much a year had a Frequent Flyer tier way up in the rarified atmosphere of 200,000-300,000 a lot of us would stick with one airline.

RWA380 · Sat Jun 09, 2012 9:58 am

Quoting BLRAviation (Reply 22):
Quoting xdlx (Reply 16):Not mentioned here... but a true ULH rote was MIA-JNB on SP and then 742B.... still a ULH by many stds.
Which airline operated this flight?

Quoting airzim (Reply 24):

Years and years ago, IAH was a tag off MIA.

Quoting Prinair (Reply 25):
don't believe IAH service on SA was a tag-on to MIA service. SA flew IAH-GIG-CPT-JNB

Quoting eta unknown (Reply 26):
It was JNB-SID-IAH & JNB-SID-JFK.

eta unknown, you got it, IAH was always a 747sp, and operated via SID, MIA came along much later, IAH was early 80's.
And GIG was the fueling stop that SAA used in the late 60's early 70's before they started using SID instead from JFK.

ltbewr · Sat Jun 09, 2012 12:47 pm

Quoting airzim (Reply 24):
The South African SP was also helpful during Apartheid sanctions to hook around the African bulge on flights to Europe, since SA did not have overflight ability, much the same way LY needs to do goofy routings to fly East from TLV

I would add changes in politics and governance in many parts of the world over the last 20 or so years has allowed more ULH flights. For many years many overflights of certain countries were limited due to military and government security or a lack of accessible diversion airports. The fall of the USSR opened up the region to allow for more overflying of ULH flights. Even today, while some places in the world are off-limits to foreign airliners overflying due to military security or politics, they are fewer and affect only a few possible flights.

Of course one of the biggest changes was major improvements in engine and other component reliability with ETOPS standards to over 3 hours means more possible ULH routes, especially long overwater ones where few if any diversion airports are available.

DIRECTFLT · Tue Jun 19, 2012 8:31 am

The Wiki Non-Stop entry lists the Air India - AI 191, from Delhi to Chicago, on the 777-300ER, as the longest flight by duration at 19:40, but with a mileage of 7,807, which same mileage, it states, is covered in 15:00 on the EVA Air flight from Taipei to New York, BR 32.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-stop_flight

(You know you can toggle each category in the list to re-sort it.)

Viscount724 · Wed Jun 20, 2012 12:08 am

Quoting DIRECTFLT (Reply 44):
The Wiki Non-Stop entry lists the Air India - AI 191, from Delhi to Chicago, on the 777-300ER, as the longest flight by duration at 19:40, but with a mileage of 7,807, which same mileage, it states, is covered in 15:00 on the EVA Air flight from Taipei to New York, BR 32.

Don't trust Wikipedia. AI's nonstop 77W DEL-ORD is AI127 and the block time is 15:55. Leaves DEL 0200, arrives ORD 0725, plus 10.5 hrs time difference.

airtechy · Wed Jun 20, 2012 4:17 am

Did any of the propliners have the endurance to do 15 -20 hour flights?

Jim

SonomaFlyer · Wed Jun 20, 2012 4:30 am

The Lockheed Starliner could do SFO to LHR non-stop. Other examples are in the linked article.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockhee...JlWYX2gkBqh6zmVlnP7BmBTJG4HdUmt8tD

RayChuang · Wed Jun 20, 2012 5:38 am

I think the reason why SQ bought the 747-400 as an early customer was so it could fly SIN-LHR non-stop and the segment between HKG and SFO on SQ 001/002 also non-stop (though occasionally SQ had to do a technical fuel stop in NRT or OKA due to stronger jet stream during the winter with the 744). Today, with its longer range, SQ has pretty much switched to the A380 and 777-300ER on most of their very long-range international flights.

Indeed, the 747SP's 6,650 nm range was the reason why Pan Am specifically bought the plane for the JFK to Tokyo route, since Pan Am had an Asian hub at HND and later NRT. It was truly the world's first ULH route. Mind you, JL never bought the 747SP, instead (I believe) did an internal project working with Boeing to extend the range of the 747-200B so it could fly JFK-NRT non-stop.

aquariusHKG · Wed Jun 20, 2012 6:35 am

Quoting airtechy (Reply 46):
Did any of the propliners have the endurance to do 15 -20 hour flights?

Jim

Many I believe, try looking at the West Coast to Europe flight back then

also the famous Flying Boat flight during WWII from Australia to Ceylon, 26 hours I believe

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