Cathay Pacific plans to operate the world’s longest passenger flight by rerouting its New York to Hong Kong service over the Atlantic to steer clear of Russian airspace.
Cathay said its transatlantic flightpath would cover just under 9,000 nautical miles – which equals 10,357 standard miles or 16,668km – in 16 to 17 hours. It if takes this path, it would surpass the current world’s longest flight for distance — 9,534 standard miles between Singapore and New York, a CNN report underlined.
On Tuesday evening, Cathay listed on its website a New York-to-Hong Kong flight for April 3 – a non-stop journey it said would stay in the air for 17 hours and 50 minutes.
Cathay refused to state the reasons for its flight path giving a wide berth to Russia’s airspace, through which it has previously flown, according to Bloomberg.
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Many airlines have cancelled routes to Russian cities or are avoiding its airspace over Moscow’s invasion of neighbouring Ukraine last month, a Guardian report said.
“We are always running contingency routings for potential events or scenarios within the world of aviation,” a representative for the airline told CNN in a statement. “We compare flight routes daily, and will plan and fly what is the most efficient routing on the day.”
“The transatlantic option relies on the facilitation of strong seasonal tailwinds at this time of the year in order for the flight time to be between 16 and 17 hours, thereby making it more favorable than the transpacific route. We are monitoring the tailwinds situation on a daily basis as it is already tapering off.
“Our Airbus A350-1000 aircraft can comfortably accomplish this in 16 to 17 hours with similar fuel consumption to the transpacific flights.”