I believe it's Atlanta to Johannesburg at 8,439 miles o/w. Second is Detroit to Hong Kong at 7,857 miles o/w.
Longest nonstop or longest direct flight? Depending on how the domestic connecting flight numbers are currently assigned, something like ATL-LAX-SYD or ATL-NRT-SIN is likely to be the longest direct flight at around 10,000 miles IIRC. For the longest segment, look at ATL/JFK-NRT, LAX-SYD, JFK-SVO, or flights to South Africa. DTW-PVG/HKG isn't short either. I'm sure someone else will jump in here with a more precise answer, but if you want to find out for yourself, I would suggest starting by looking at the flights I've mentioned.
Educational note: At one point, the NW nonstop JFK-KIX or more precisely to the old Osaka international terminal on a 747-400 was the longest nonstop flight in the world at 13 hours and 26 minutes IIRC. This would have been the early 1990s.
This wiki is quite accurate (I have checked about a third of them and gave up because they were all correct. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-stop_flight That confirms: and also: I am surprised how many of them I've been on, dating from the PA and IranAir Tehran-JFK in a 747SP that was the longest in it's day long long ago. The SQ21/22 is one of my favorite flights today.
Even with historical flights, you need to be careful with lengths of time. Headwinds, particularly across the Pacific, can add significantly to the time of the flight. Sometimes LAX-MEL gets into the 15-16 hours range. Not sure the distance changes, though.
When did you fly Iran Air? As to sq 21/22, if you like that flight, you have plenty of time to savor it!
Another educational note: At one time, in the late 19702/early 1980s for example, TWA flew SFO-OAK in an L-1011 with a scheduled flight time of ten minutes. The distance is about fifteen miles.
I stand corrected by 6 miles. I always think mainline service. Then again, I don't think they fly mainline between DTW-FNT anymore. <edit>They are only scheduled for RJ
I used to live in Tehran and flew iran Air very often. BTW, they still have two 747SP in service, IIRC the only one still in normally scheduled passenger service. A dozen of them are still in asort sort of service all of them in the Middle East. Most of them are VIP transport, something for which a "small" 747 was ideally suited. All my information comes from here: http://www.747sp.com/Operators.asp Seriously OT: BTW, IranAir 747SP spawned one of my favorite flight stories. In 1977 I flew nonstop TEH-JFK on IranAir and took along a carryon stuffed full of Imperial grade caviar for my colleagues there, as I usually did. I had checked the bag. It did not arrive; I was paid the compensation. End of story, not. I had given the address of my New York office, now inhabited by friends, as the delivery address. Three years later, in 1980 (after the revolution in Iran BTW), I was again visiting New York. All my friends had moved on, but by a freak coincidence I was visiting the new occupants fo my former office. While I was there a telephone call came for me (the numbers were still the same, remember this was 1980). Odd, I thought, because I'd given the number to no one. On the telephone was Pan Am, representing IranAir, saying they had my bag and could they deliver it???!! I had forgotten, but the agent reminded me that it had been "some time". The bag arrived, the caviar tins were inside, cleaned, and the bag was in perfect shape. Someone had had some excellent caviar. I still have the bag.
As I recall, the 747SP was funny looking due to its smaller size but totally top notch regarding the long range technology at the time. Yet again, you sir surprise us again, great story!
I've seen at least one of IR's 747-SPs at LHR...perhaps 5 years ago. The proportion was strikingly different to me. I read a trip report not too long ago from someone on one of Syrian's 747-SPs. I don't think they've updated the interior since the plane was delivered in the mid-70s! Wow! That's both a great and terrible story! Unreal!
I think she's cute, sort of like some of the tiny RJs that look like miniature versions of DC-9s or other mainline aircraft.
I stated the scheduled flight time, not the actual flying time on some particular day. When I took the flight, the scheduled time seemed about right with no major deviations that I remember.
Haha, no!! This is an unplanned KBL DXB ATL LAX return trip because my grandmother died yesterday. I was supposedly not flying anywhere for 78 days since I was in KBL. Well, that did not work out. It was cheaper for my work to get me all the way to LAX than LHR, from which I'd have had to pay my own way. Fortunately, DL was cheaper than Emirates and I'm not in a middle seat...I'd rather not requalify for DM right yet, but am going to do so. Thankfully, a couple of those 764's got me back to the USA last month and I did get to see Gram before I went to KBL. I'll be back to my 764 LHR trips June 29.
