The world's longest non-stop flight (19 hours) takes off from Singapore

BBC ^ | 10-11-18

[Simon Green]

The world's longest commercial flight has left Singapore for New York, beginning a journey expected to cover more than 15,000km in almost 19 hours.

A spokeswoman for Singapore Airlines said Flight SQ22 departed at approximately 15:35GMT with 150 passengers and 17 crew.

The flight from Changi Airport to Newark took off amid much fanfare.

The flight time is about 90 minutes longer than the previous longest non-stop service.

Qantas launched a 17-hour non-stop service from Perth to London earlier this year, while Qatar runs a 17.5-hour service between Auckland and Doha.

Have passengers been snapping up the tickets?

Singapore Airlines (SIA) said there was demand for customers for non-stop services which help cut travelling times compared with flights which have a stopover.

Ahead of the take-off, the airline told the BBC that business class seats for the flight were fully booked, and there were "a very limited number" of premium economy seats left.

The airline is not planning to offer any economy bookings on the route.

A business class ticket will entitle passengers to two meals, and the choice of when they are served, plus refreshments in between. They will also have a bed to sleep in.

Premium economy fares will get three meals at fixed times, with refreshments in between.

The brand new Airbus plane that SIA is using has been configured to seat 161 passengers in all - 67 business passengers and 94 premium economy passengers.

"The thinking behind that is that they are selling a premium product - it's for the top end of town," says aviation expert Geoffrey Thomas, who was booked on to Thursday's flight.

[A Formerly Proud Canadian]

Guess you could always take 'a slow boat to China Singapore'.

[airplaneguy]

Obviously this route is a heavy Business oriented route so it would seem that most people will be of working age. So hopefully they’ll be in good health and able to handle long fatiguing flights. Its sad but on some leisure routes I’ve seen older people that want to go back to the “old country” one more time, end up expiring before they get there.

[rjsimmon]

Ha! MH370 got that beat. Still ain’t landed yet.

[HombreSecreto]

Or the crying baby / screaming toddler...and you forgot your earplugs.

[SpaceBar]

It's like the reality show Big Brother, but if something goes really wrong you can't just storm out of the double-wide on a parking lot in Studio City.

[Mollypitcher1]

Melbourne to Los Angeles is a pretty long flight, but with Quantas and the Boeing DREAMLINER quite a nice flight. I won’t fly Airbus If can help it.

[hattend]

Hell, I can barely handle the 6 hr flight from Anchorage to Chicago.

I flew on a military charter DC-8 from Philly to Dhahran with a stop in Ireland. Took about 12 hours. That’s the longest flight I have ever been on.

18 to 20 hours would kill me.

[Glennb51]

21 hours, including a stop for fuel, from Jo’burg to Atlanta. The stop was just long enough to take on fuel. We were not allowed off the aircraft.

I spent a lot of time walking up and down the aisle and doing calf raises.

[OldMissileer]

The worst flight I had was from Washington Dulles to Frankfurt, Germany. I was in an isle seat in the center (B-747) and had a eight year old boy sitting next to me. He was one of six children from a family using standby tickets.

He only stopped talking when I persuaded him to take a nap and his parents never once came up to see how he was doing. Ten hours of misery.

Just before we landed the head stewardess gave me and the young lady sitting opposite the child each a complimentary bottle of wine as a thank you for dealing with the kid.

[moose07]

Enjoy the FLight. :)

I’ve done LHR (Heathrow)-LAX- Aukland....seriously thought my time was up on landing. UGH!

[SamAdams76]

Those long-distance flights to Asia out of JFK typically fly right over my house in Southern Connecticut. I have an app called Flight Tracker which will identify planes coming overhead and tell me where they are coming from, where they are going and even show current altitude, airspeed and other info. It's pretty amazing that kind of information is available through a phone app. Typically they are just getting to 20,000 feet when they come over my house and they will have 12 or more hours of flight time to go. The path takes them over Canada, Alaska and then down the Aleutians towards Asia.

However, the long distance flights that impress me most are the Air Force bombers that can take off at a base in Nebraska, cross the Atlantic, drop their bombs and then fly all the way back home without having to stop. This was going on during the Gulf wars. I'm pretty sure they are re-fueled mid-air but that's still impressive.

Imagine being a pilot on one of those planes and after landing, stopping for a steak dinner on the way home. Must be kind of surreal sitting there at an Outback in the middle of America, having just dropped a bunch of bombs over Iraq or Afghanistan. All in a days work.

[vespa300]

I fly American Airlines from Dallas to Orange County CA once a month. Just enough time to watch Saturday Night Fever and then prepare for landing. 2.5 Hours.

19 Hours non stop? Unimaginable. But then again the Singapore Airline Attendants vs American Air......I can only imagine. Some of the guys I play tennis with fly internationally and have nothing but good things to say about Singapore Airlines and their help...:)

[hal ogen]

I don’t care what “class’ you sit in...just how many bad movies can you tolerate???

[nicollo]

In 1980s I flew from DC to Asuncion on an Eastern Airlines 727, which took 24 hrs, albeit with stops in:
1. Miami
2. Panama
3. Columbia
4. Ecuador
5. Peru
6. Bolivia
7. Paraguay.

I got off at each stop, and I nearly missed getting back on the flight from LaPaz, as I made the mistake of drinking a beer and lighting up a Camel at 12,000 ft and got a little woozy and lost track of time. A solder got me out of the bar while another ran with the portable stairs to stop the plane — mid-taxi— to let me back on. I love those little guys to this day!

In late 80s, AA bought Eastern. I read in the news that when they stripped one of the old Eastern 727s from that route they found bricks of cocaine hidden beneath the cockpit, lol.

AA then added MIA-GRU-ASU, and eventually had MIA-ASU direct flights, which only took 8 hrs.

[9422WMR]

Hope you had a seat cushion!!

[MplsSteve]

Agreed.

I’ve always wanted to fly from the Twin Cities to Israel, Dubai or South Africa.

I’ve told the wife on a few occasions that for a trip that long, I’ll shell out the extra money for first class seats and service.

If I’m gonna be in a plane that long, I might as well enjoy having a comfortable seat that converts to a bed as well as some privacy and good food.

[Jim Noble]

You can go from the East Coast to JNB nonstop, but you can’t come back because the plane can’t take off with a full fuel load (elevation).

On my trip, we landed at 2am to refuel in Sal (Cape Verde), and the international transit “lounge” there was like a scene from Dante’s inferno.

SAA has been experimenting with various stops in West Africa for the JNB-USA refueling, but I don’t know that they’ve settled on a permanent solution.

[Dundee]

It would be interesting to see how long a Melbourne - New York (16,662 km) or Melbourne - London (16,893 km) flight would be.

Hobart to Reykjavík (17,543 km) would be banned under the Geneva Convention as a war crime.

[Mean Daddy]

I worked with a guy who flew bombing missions over Vietnam that started in North Dakota. Always had hard candy with to keep him focused. Said flying is pretty boring once you took off.