My shortest flight was from Peoria, Illinois to Moline, IL, in the 1980s. It was actually one leg of a flight that continued on to Denver, IIRC. It had a straight-line distance of about 70 miles. I think they said the flight took about 19 or 20 minutes.
I don’t know what my shortest flight would be if you only count starting point to final destination–maybe Lima to Cuzco, Peru, about 360 miles.
The smallest commercial airplane I’ve ever flown in was a Fairchild Aerospace Metro III, which had a capacity of 19 passengers. This was a flight from Gainesville, FL, to Orlando in the late 1990s. Here’s a picture of the delightful interior of one of these planes.
I once flew in a jumbo jet from Oakland, CA to San Francisco, a distance of approximately 10 miles. This was the last leg of a flight from the East Coast. I can’t remember if this was a planned route or if there was some extenuating circumstance. I do remember the pilot saying words to the effect of “We’re cleared for landing at San Francisco International Airport. We’ll be taking off momentarily.”
Not quite as short as some others, but I once flew from Asheville, North Carolina to Atlanta, which Google tells me is a flight distance of 164 miles. It took a little over a half hour. It was the first leg of a trip from Asheville to Indianapolis, on Delta. Which is why it went through Atlanta, of course.
When we got to cruising altitude, the flight attendant actually announced, “You are now free to use electronic devices, with the exception of cell phones–but you might as well not bother, because we’ll be starting our descent in about five minutes.” Sure enough, five minutes later she was announcing, “Please turn off all electronic devices.”
I’ve done legs of flights between airstrips in Panama that were as little as 7 miles apart. The shortest starting point to final destination was probably from Panama City to the Pearl Islands, maybe 35 miles.
I’m not sure what the smallest plane was but it was probably no more than an 8 or 10 seater.
I think my shortest was Midway to Indianapolis, about 150 miles. It was an ATA (remember them?) turboprob with 1x2 seating and maybe 40 passengers or so.
Well, it was supposed to be Chicago To Milwaukee, something like 17 minutes at 5000 feet. But then we taxied around, sat on the tarmac, had some parts swapped out, fueled up, pumped fuel back out and 3 hours later got back out without ever leaving the ground. The next morning we took a bus back to Milwaukee.
About a half hour into all this (still at the gate) one guy asked if he could leave and he announced to the rest of us that he was going to be renting a car and driving back and was looking for anyone to split the cost with him. We all kinda laughed and watched him leave assuming we’d be taking off soon. Two hours after that I looked at someone and mentioned that that guy was probably already at home and we’re still sitting on the plane. At that point it was still going to be a while before they cancelled the flight…and then they messed up booking us a place to stay for the night. It was one trainwreck after another.
The shortest leg would have been the 50 miles from Bogota to Villavecencio, Colombia, but I didn’t deplane there. It’s a 7,000 foot elevation drop, which takes 2.5 hours by car, and basically the plane just clears the buildings in Bogota and glides down to Villavicencio.
Shortest where I got on and off was probably Chicago to Milwaukee, 100 miles. A couple of others of around 125 miles would be Beirut to Larnaca, Cyprus, and from Mauritius to Reunion, anc Gander to Deer Lake, Newfo0undland… Also under 150, Sucre to Santa Cruz, Bolivia, and Medellin to Bogota, and Russe to Sofia, Bulgara. All my short flights seem to be clustered in that 200-250 Km range.
I don’t think I’ve ever been on a really small commercial plane. Smallest probably in Bolivia, with about 50-60 seats, on the military airline that flies passengers in the troop tansports when there is no war going on.
Oh gosh, never again. I found a really cheap flight to get to the family Christmas gathering one year. It was this convoluted trip with three stops, and the final leg was Detroit to Cleveland.
Oh man oh man. The city bus I take to work is bigger than whatever this plane was. I think you could’ve parked it in my parent’s garage and still had room for the lawnmower. I’m pretty sure it was made out of balsa wood. The propellors were actually those little colorful pinwheel things you stick on a spike in your garden. You could fit about twenty people on the plane; I think there were ten rows of seats.
I know (now) that the temperature differences over large bodies of water versus over land can cause some turbulence. If you look at a map, the entire goddamn flight from Detroit to Cleveland consists of taking off directly in that turbulent zone and then immediately descending into it’s counterpart. You’re at “cruising altitude” for like three minutes on a flight like that. And here we are in a slightly enlarged version of the little toy airplanes you can buy at the gift shop in the terminal, and up front the pilot’s pedaling as hard as he can so we don’t miss our scheduled landing time in Cleveland.
I pay more attention to what plane I’m booking a ticket for now.
I flew on several occasions between Honolulu and Lihue on Kaua’i which is listed as 63 miles.
Smallest commercial flight I remember was on a six passenger plane which I don’t remember what it was (other than really tiny) or the departure and arrival locations.
Cessna 185, took off from a northern lake, into a friend’s woodland cabin. Definitely smaller than the interior of our car (Buick). The plane seats 4.
Nervous as I was, I must admit, it went a long way to curing my jittery nerves in regards to air travel. Mostly because I sat beside the pilot, got a great view, plus I could really feel the, ‘It MUST lift!’ part, in my bones as it were.
When I booked our flights, I confessed I didn’t know how to explain exactly which island/cabin we were headed to. No worries, they said, you can just point!
(Only airline, I’ve ever booked a flight on, that did not require a credit card to make a reservation!)
Shortest would be Bush Intercontinental to Hobby (both in Houston) on a shuttle flight that Continental briefly offered in the '80s (by DC-9, yet). Distance by road is listed as 30 miles, but the air route was actually a bit longer because the plane swung out to the east a ways before the run in to the destination airport.
Next shortest probably is Johnstown to Pittsburgh, PA, about 60 miles. At different times I’ve flown in Beech 1900, Swearingen Metro, and SAAB 340 on that route. That doesn’t win smallest aircraft honors, however; that would go to a Beechcraft or Piper (can’t remember which) light twin Salt Lake City-Vernal, UT, also in the '80s. Six passengers on that one.
Wellington, NZ to Blenheim is only about 50 miles or so on a tiny turboprop. I think there were only about 14 seats. No cabin door. You could lean out into the aisle and watch the landing lineup through the windscreen.
Samoa to American Samoa is an international flight. It is less about 30 miles on an even smaller plane (a Twin Otter, I think). They weigh each passenger with carryons and allocate your seat according to your weight.
My answer to both is a flight from Yuma, AZ to Phoenix on a Friday afternoon back in 1996, it was about 45 minutes in the air. My wife and I, on the back leg of a cross-country road trip, were stranded in the tiny town of Tacna, AZ (about 40 miles from Yuma) when our car broke down, and the local mechanics kept finding more and more reasons why they weren’t finished with our car. We were determined to spend Shabbat with a Jewish community rather than alone, so when it became clear that we wouldn’t get our car back with enough time to drive to Phoenix for Shabbat, we got them to give us a ride to the airport in Yuma, where we were able to get a flight that got us to Phoenix just in time. (We took a Greyhound back the next night.)
Don’t remember just how small the plane was, but I don’t think it had room for more than two dozen passengers.
