Air travel can be a long and arduous process. But, for residents of California, that doesn’t have to be the case – thanks to the latest chartered route by United Airlines.
The US carrier have recently launched America’s shortest-ever commercial flight, which boasts a flying time of just sixteen minutes.
Time flies! Departing from San Francisco to Santa Rosa, a small city in Sonoma County, it covers just over sixty miles
Departing from San Francisco to Santa Rosa, a small city in Sonoma County, it covers just over sixty miles.
Operating once a day, all year-round, it’s listed with a total flight time of 45 minutes, but this includes tarmac time, such as taxiing after take-off and landing.
This means that passengers completing the journey, via SkyWest, spend more time on the ground than they do in the friendly skies.
Despite this, it’s certainly not the world’s quickest flight. Currently, that’s held by Loganair’s service from Westray to Papa Westray in Scotland’s Orkney Islands. The 1.7 mile route lasts just 90 seconds.
Meanwhile, People’s Air Group recently operated a flight from Switzerland to Germany – the world’s shortest international flight – which took just eight minutes.
It was cancelled earlier this year due to lack of demand.
Quick get-away: Operating once a day, all year-round, it’s listed with a total flight time of 45 minutes, but this includes tarmac time, such as taxiing after take-off and landing
However, proving there is demand for super short-haul travel, United’s new Santa Rosa flight was announced along with a number of other, similar destinations from San Francisco: Hartford, Spokane and Kalispell.
‘Every day in San Francisco we proudly welcome more than 30,000 customers aboard United Airlines and this announcement demonstrates our commitment to being the Bay Area’s leading U.S. airline,’ said Mike Hanna, United’s vice president of its San Francisco International Airport hub.
‘These additional flights and larger aircraft to new cities and those already part of our network will offer customers even more convenient flight options and easy connections to popular destinations around the U.S. and Canada’.
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