This is both a GQ and a IMHO, so I’m putting it here.
GQ:
What is the longest currently offered non-stop flight that is regularly available? Remember, I’m looking for currently offered and regularly offered(even if it is once a week).
IMHO:
**
What is the longest non-stop flight you have been on?**
I’ll start:
I flew from New York to Seoul, Korea. It was scheduled for 14 Hours, 50 minutes. It was 15 Hours, 26 minutes(yes, I was checking).
Hey, I did it back with my new daughter, who was 10 months old! That one was more like 14 1/2 hours, but the baby made it feel a bit longer.
And then, we had to fly from NY to Detroit with the baby. Yeesh!
When I first flew Singapore to London it was over 16 hours (IIRC). The whole flight from Brisbane to Dublin took about 30 hours from airport to airport.
I’m flying Singapore to London in October and that is now 13 hours plus.
O’Hare to Hong Kong. 15 1/2 fucking hours in an aging United 747, 31" seat pitch, geriatric flight attendents with an attitude, and it didn’t even have a personal TV screen. It was pretty close to hell on earth.
Toronto to Singapore, several times, can’t remember now which was the longest. I’m thinking something over 15 hrs anyway. But how are you counting time on the ground refueling? 45 mins in Seattle, 50 mins in Tokyo/Hong Kong, etc.
After several trips I learned to fly to Chicago where I connected to a non stop JAL flight to Tokyo. It included a night at their hotel at Narita, next morning on to Singapore or Bangkok. Tres civilized, it included all meals, get your boarding pass in the lobby, shuttle to terminal, arrived much more refreshed and way, way less jet lagged.
What do you call “flight”? I was sitting captive in a wide body 747 from Detroit to Frankfurt for over 15 hours due to fuel issues. We weren’t flying the whole time but it still didn’t change the flight attendant’s insistence that we all remain seated with our seatbelts on and our tray tables in the upright position. <grrrr>
Miami to Cape Town, in 1998. I don’t think the flight is offered anymore. The distance is 7627 miles; it must have been about 14 hours or so.
That’s the longest non-stop. The longest trips by plane I’ve taken have been between Panama and Gabon, with stops in Atlanta and Paris (sometimes Washington DC too). The outward trip took 36 hours, but that included a 17 hour layover in Paris.
Definitely between Tokyo or Taipei and San Francisco or Los Angeles. Can’t remember the exact number of hours, because it’s mixed in with the Bangkok-Tokyo/Taipei leg, but maybe, oh, 11 or 12 hours for that leg alone. If not longer.
Chicago to Mumbai, 2005. One of the very few non-stops there were. What a mistake. Just shy of 18 hours. And I was flying coach! With quite a few people who weren’t brainwashed by Madison Avenues standard of cleanliness and odor (no offense meant to anyone. But can we be brutally honest about what most Americans are raised to find acceptable “fragrances”?).
To make it even worse, I was on my way to accept an official work detail, so** NO ALCOHOL CONSUMPTION ALLOWED!**. :eek: Booze was available and the first few drinks were free, but I couldn’t have any!
I saw RAY 4 times and The Incredibles 4 times. I thought I’d lose my mind. I contemplated stabbing my eyeballs with the salad fork for just to keep things interesting. I tried to sleep but it was like trying to sleep while strapped to the electric chair and sealed in the gas chamber.
I flew home from Delhi. On the way back I traded up my tickets so I could spend some time in London. No freaking way was I going to spend 18 hours on a plane without a couple of days in-between.
The trip from ORD to Hawaii (10 hours) is no picnic either!
I feel like a lightweight here, but I’ve done Toronto-Honolulu (9 or 10 hours) with a connection to Sydney (another 9 or 10 hours). I had maybe an hour or two layover in Honolulu. Crossing the International Date Line meant I had no idea what time or day it was when I landed in Sydney. But apparently my declaration of “I started my journey in Toronto, Canada; here’s my passport and visa” was good enough for the Australian immigration official to let me proceed to Customs.
Good thing too. If I’d been turned back, it would have been another 20 hours in coach to home, and I’d have had to check a calendar as to when I was.
We had friends heading out to NZ, and they took a direct (i.e there was a refuelling stopover, but no disembarking) flight London-Sydney - 20 or so hours in the plane.
2 hours in, a lass a few seats back started vomiting - norovirus. A few hours later, many people in the section were ill, including our friends. With a baby and 15 hours to go, plus a link flight from Sydney to Auckland. Not the best flight in the world.
Up to 14 hours from London to Hong Kong. I always fly Virgin Atlantic on this journey, so it doesn’t feel so bad, as the in-flight entertainment is superlative and the food is quite good. These days I have enough air miles to upgrade to Premium Economy - and once to Upper Class, which was a revelation and has ruined coach class for me forever.
Mine was a puny London to Los Angeles on Virgin. We were booked in Premium Economy and were asked if we’d mind terribly if we got bumped up to Upper Class. They have an actual bar with bar stools! I wanted to just sit there getting hammered (for free!) for the whole trip but had to drive when we got to L.A.
FTR, when I flew Upper Class I enjoyed:[ul][li]Limo pickup from my house.[]A big leather armchair that can be fully reclined during takeoff and landing…[/li][li]…with a guest seat.[/li][li]The armchair flips over at the touch of a button to become a bed…[/li][li]…in which I wore my complimentary pajamas…[/li][li]…and snuggled under the duvet.[/li][li]There’s a restaurant-standard menu…[/li][li]…that can be ordered from as often as required, at any time.[/li][li]The bar that kferr mentioned.[/li][li]Better looking stewardesses than coach (I’m not kidding).[/li][li]A screamingly gay chief steward who turned the in-flight announcements into a screamingly funny standup routine.[/li][li]A hand and head massage in-flight.[/li][li]Big-screen console on which I could watch on demand…[/li][li]…newer movie releases than coach.[/li][li]A chill-out lounge at the end of the journey with free breakfast, showers, etc.[/li][li]Wireless internet.[/ul]*“Here’s how to operate the seatbelt. Though to be honest if you don’t know how to operate a seatbelt by now, you have more problems than we can help with.”[/li]
“Please administer your own mask before attending to those of your children. If you have more than one child, perhaps this is the time to work out which one you love most…”
I once did Detroit to Chicago to Los Angeles to Sidney to Adelaide (our company was rather cheap with airfare). I left on a Wednesday and landed on like Friday. It was a total of something like 22-26 hours. The bad part was on the last leg of the flight coming home, I realized I locked my keys in my car and had to deal with that when I landed. The good part is that I was a contractor at the time and got paid for the flight, so I got to bill an extra 40+ hours.
