Record breaking flight by Air India by changing course in San Francisco-Delhi route
Source: telegraph.co.uk, 27 October 2016
Air India has registered itself at front to take on the longest non-stop flight route according to the Telegraph.
Until prior to this month, the Delhi to San Francisco route of the airlines stood second in the chart of maximum distances flown by a passenger jet, but then the Indian flag carrier altered the course of journey from voyage to the Atlantic to the Pacific, and supplemented 1,400 kilometers (870 miles) on its path.
The eastern course destined that Air India’s Boeing-777 200ER flew 15,300 kilometers (9,506 miles), transcending the previous holder of world’s longest flight, Dubai-Auckland route by Emirates Airlines that racks up 14,120 kilometers (8,825 miles). By moving east over the Pacific, Air India took benefit of the Jet Stream that provided 86mph tailwinds and reduced two hours off its flight time, jacketing the distance only in 14-and-a-half hours.
A senior Air India official told the Times of India that the wind flows from west to east as earth also rotates in the same direction. “Sturdy headwinds will be encountered while flying west which decrease an aircraft’s definite ground speed, and flying east means receiving strong tailwinds, which do the reverse.”
He told that flying across the Atlantic typically brings headwinds of 24kmph, taking the aircraft’s speed at around 776kmph, while the eastern route over the Pacific usually faces tailwinds of 138kmph, making the aircraft’s ground speed around 938kmph.
The aircraft’s crew were said to be elated at the record. “The aircraft took off from Delhi at 4am on Sunday (October 16) morning. We were in that date until Japan. Then, we traversed the International Date Line and were in October 15. We landed in San Francisco at 6.30am on October 16,” one of the pilots expressed to the newspaper.
The eastern route flies over Myanmar and China which subsequently heads over the East China Sea, dodging Japan, prior to crossing the Pacific and landing at the West Coast city.
FlightRadar24.com confirmed the record-breaking route, which Air India has constantly brought to use from before. The carrier then flies the return leg over the Atlantic as before.
India’s Director General of Civil Aviation permitted to make changes to the service of Air India to that route.
The record will not situate for long, however, as Singapore Airlines prepares to bring back its Singapore-New York route that will cover 16,500 kilometers (10,252 miles) in 19 hours.
