In the case of the flight between Moorea and Tahiti, they’re islands and it is not possible to make a road connecting the two. There is a ferry that goes both ways between Moorea and Tahiti that takes approximately 40 minutes so it is possible to go back and forth without flying.
I’ve done Blenheim to Wellington (or vice versa) several times. Very short hop plus you can lean into the aisle and see through the front windscreen. Although Samoa to Am Samoa is even better. You can tap the pilot on the shoulder and ask questions if you want.
Over water: Vancouver to Victoria Island - 25 minutes
Flew Chicago O’Hare to Milwaukee on a 737 a long time ago - it took much longer from the gate at O’Hare to the head of the runway at O’Hare than from the head of the runway at O’Hare to the gate in Milwaukee. I remember being in the air for what seemed like 5 minutes, but must have been a longer since the air distance is 67 miles.
The very short Orkney flights are just stops on a circuit of the islands. No-one really commutes from Westray to Papa Westray (the really short one) by air, but if you want to travel between unadjacent islands, it’s likely the quickest way.
Last month I flew from Doha, Qatar, to Bahrain, which is listed at 45 minutes on the schedule. There is neither a road bridge nor a ferry connecting the two countries, but it is possible to drive from one to the other in a day, through Saudi Arabia.
Fiji has two international airports, Nandi and Suva, and the flight connecting them is listed at 30 minutes.
I just found four scheduled flights a day, Belize to Caulker Cay, scheduled as 5 minute flights:
2:40 PM – 2:45 PM
Belize City (BZE) – Caye Caulker (CUK)
Moldavian Airlines 2160 · Cessna (Light)
Propeller plane
0h 05m
No Wi-Fi
Kind of a bummer with no Wi-Fi – tough it out.
There’s an Air France flight (or used to be) from Basel, Switzerland to Mulhouse, France. Scheduled duration: 1 minute.
*It’s the same airport. * The plane doesn’t even leave the gate, it just turns into a French domestic flight that can therefore land at Paris Orly.
Unrelated: I never noted the time, but the Allegheny schedule once showed service between Northeast Philadelphia and Philadelphia International - with a change of planes in Pittsburgh.
Props though to whoever thought of calling this outfit Moldavian Airlines.
Must have been a headwind.
The world’s shortest domestic flight is currently the mile-long journey from Westray to Papa Westray in Scotland’s Orkey Islands, which can take as little as 47 seconds, depending on wind direction.
A bidding war over the route was settled in 2013, with the contract being awarded to Scottish airline Loganair, its current operator.
Article I cited on this resurrection.
I think that’s an error in whatever database that came from. A Belizean airline called Maya Island Air uses the code (2M) that used to be assigned to Moldavian Airlines.
Pilot asks the con-tower for permission to take-off.
Contower operator says “Yes”, picks up a pair of binoculars and says “I can give you permission to land too”
That Belize flight can still be booked today at Kayak, under Tropic Air, listed as an 8-minue flight.
Back in the dim days of my childhood, TransTexas Airways used to offer service between what is now Hobby Airport in Houston and Galveston. Physical distance is about 40 miles, and even in the old DC3s they used to fly, it didn’t take long.
And IIRC, Continental used to have an express service from Hobby up to Intercontinental. The flight would come into one or the other, then fly to the other, then fly out to wherever. This was jet service for a distance of 30 miles or so. I don’t think it lasted for very long.
The old “now entering…”/“now leaving…” one either side of city limits sign.
My entry is Toronto to Niagara-on-the-Lake. 32 miles from airport to airport over Lake Ontario.
This flight was offered because to take the trip by car requires you to drive around the lake (meaning about a 75 mile drive) and through massive traffic. The car trip can take 1.25 hours or 3 hours depending on the traffic situation.
You can also catch a flight from LAX to Ontario, which despite the short distance can be shockingly pricey. You cannot, I don’t believe, fly from Ontario to John Wayne.
A friend (now dead) recalled doing Miami to Key West, just being a giant hop, in an old DC-3.
The current KW to Miami flight is about 45 mins total.