What Am I Doing?: March 2016

HIS is your captain speaking. Welcome aboard Economist flight DEC20 to London. Today's in-flight entertainment is an info-graphic of the longest commercial flights—“ultra long-haul” routes that last more than 12 hours. We regret to announce that the lengthiest—Singapore Airlines’ flight from the city-state to Newark Airport near New York, at 15,263km—was discontinued last month. That now makes Qantas’ Sydney to Dallas flight the longest, at 13,790km. For those traveling during the holidays, spare a thought for passengers strapped into their seats for around 16 hours, the journey time for these flights. That’s double the duration it took Concorde to complete a similar distance (going round trip between London and Barbados). In the chart below, scroll down to see how these ultra long-haul flights compare. And thank you for choosing The Economist. We appreciate that there are other chart providers and we hope to serve you again for all your info-graphic interests.