http://www.cnn.com/travel/article/british-airways-shortest-flight-scli-gbr-intl/

I flew a scheduled airline flight, from Oakland to SFO, on a Swearingen Metroliner back in the 80's, and I flew between Burlington VT and Plattsburgh NY once.  Shortest jet commercial flight I ever flew on was an American 767 between Zurich and Geneva, followed by many flights between SFO and Reno back in the 80's.   I also flew short commercial hops in Michigan outbound from O'Hare to Pellston once in '94--lol I was home in Napa CA earlier that morning on my day off, I picked up the phone when it rang thinking I could never be called into work being a business systems traveler.  I was wrong, I was asked to replace a fellow team lead who got sick in Michigan.  I drove to Sacto, flew nonstop to O'hare then connected on a puddle jumper to Michigan and was at work before midnight some nine hours after leaving Sacto, my longest ever series of US flights in terms of time traveled.

John

I flew from Birmingham Alabama to Atlanta on a L1011 back in the early 90's. Weather and circling it took longer than if I had driven the 147 miles. 

I flew the metro in the 1990s. Shortest flight we did was between two island communities of about 5 miles.......CYIV - CYST. Before working for the outfit with metros I flew that same leg in the E110 bandit. You could take off to the northwest out of CYIV and that would drop you right into a left base landing to the southwest at CYST.

@dbw1: Your post piqued my interest...was wondering if you were working for Rafael Zur at the time? (I'm sure you have some stories if you did!)

Actually I don't know the name or I can't recall it. A year after doing that leg in the metro I was doing it in  the HS748, the Hawker, as it was known then. Fun flying back then in that part of the world. gravel strips for the most part, 3000 - 4000', soft in the spring. Doing an approach in reduced viz at night some places the street lights would be brighter than the runway lights, no vasis or papi back then. One developed a good foundation and skills working in that environment. Almost speared an eagle one day landing on 22 at CYST...it went right in front of my window so close I could see individual feathers on his wings. Thought I nailed him/her for sure but no...I think we were being warned off a nest nearby. Fantastic wildlife in that part of the world. Fun flying.This is Manitoba, Canada. I retired a few years ago.

On the subject of short flights, I did quite a few return flights from Dublin to Shannon in the 70s on Aer Lingus 747s (and 707s) when I was a student in Dublin. A few of these were on the jump seat courtesy of the uncle of my girlfriend at the time who was a captain with EI but he very kindly also got me a buddy pass and, as the domestic legs of these TATL flights were generally only about half full, standby seats were usually very easy to come by. As my home was only a few miles from Shannon, this was a great way for a student to get home for a weekend!

At just over 100nm, this was one of the shortest scheduled 747 flights and was the result of an Irish government policy designating Shannon as the only transatlantic gateway to Ireland thus requiring a compulsory EINN stopover for all  transatlantic flights into the country until the mid 1990s. As runway 06/24 at Shannon was almost in direct alignment with runway 06/24 (now closed) at Dublin, the route between the two often required almost no change in heading with a flying time of about 15-20 minutes. It was usually flown at FL150/160 but very early on one beautiful clear morning the captain decided to cancel the IFR plan as he taxied out for take off at EINN and, filing a VFR plan instead, flew our 707 to EIDW at 1500-2000ft! I doubt if that could happen today!

Bill

On 3/23/2019 at 11:04 AM, scianoir said:

On the subject of short flights, I did quite a few return flights from Dublin to Shannon in the 70s on Aer Lingus 747s (and 707s) when I was a student in Dublin. A few of these were on the jump seat courtesy of the uncle of my girlfriend at the time who was a captain with EI but he very kindly also got me a buddy pass and, as the domestic legs of these TATL flights were generally only about half full, standby seats were usually very easy to come by. As my home was only a few miles from Shannon, this was a great way for a student to get home for a weekend!

At just over 100nm, this was one of the shortest scheduled 747 flights and was the result of an Irish government policy designating Shannon as the only transatlantic gateway to Ireland thus requiring a compulsory EINN stopover for all  transatlantic flights into the country until the mid 1990s. As runway 06/24 at Shannon was almost in direct alignment with runway 06/24 (now closed) at Dublin, the route between the two often required almost no change in heading with a flying time of about 15-20 minutes. It was usually flown at FL150/160 but very early on one beautiful clear morning the captain decided to cancel the IFR plan as he taxied out for take off at EINN and, filing a VFR plan instead, flew our 707 to EIDW at 1500-2000ft! I doubt if that could happen today!

Bill

I flew in and out of Shannon just once, on a TransInternational (Later renamed TransAmerica) airlines DC8-63 that was inbound from Vienna on its way to JFK.  We stopped in Shannon for a refueling stop as part of more than 200 high school students that were on various tours of Europe in April of '77.  We then stopped one more time, in Gander, before landing in JFK for our connecting flights, in my case home to SFO on first an American 707 to Dallas, then an American 727 to SFO. 

My TIA flight originated in Munich, and given the length of our connections, refueling stops and connecting flights it took me more than 30 hours of transit to get home from Munich, the longest series of one way flights in my life.  Even my trip to Guam from SFO via Narita, though longer in air miles, did not take as much time in the air. 

So if my Oakland-SFO Metroliner flight was my shortest airline flight, that oceanic travel day home, which began on Easter Sunday in Europe in 1977 and ended the next Monday morning when my father drove me home to Napa from SFO, was the longest I have ever flown in terms of time traveled from origin (Munich) to Destination (Napa).

John

9 hours ago, John_Cillis said:

I flew in and out of Shannon just once, on a TransInternational (Later renamed TransAmerica) airlines DC8-63 that was inbound from Vienna on its way to JFK.  We stopped in Shannon for a refueling stop as part of more than 200 high school students that were on various tours of Europe in April of '77.  We then stopped one more time, in Gander, before landing in JFK for our connecting flights,

There must have been some strong headwinds that day if a Gander refuelling stop was also required between Shannon and JFK!

Bill

On 3/25/2019 at 4:40 AM, scianoir said:

There must have been some strong headwinds that day if a Gander refuelling stop was also required between Shannon and JFK!

Bill

That, and our DC8-63 was full and had limited range and a low cruise altitude of FL290 probably in the brunt of the Jet Stream.

My fastest Atlantic crossing going the other way was six hours once from JFK to Frankfurt.  My fastest ever flight was Seattle to Phoenix once, our pilot said our ground speed was 750 mph and the trip was just shy of 90 mins, the pilot said at that time we broke the record for the route.  Also flew from Phoenix to Orlando once and we had a ground speed of over 650 mph for about an hour as we entered the Jet Stream on our Airbus A320.   It pays to go from West to East, that is for sure.  The rest of the flight averaged a more modest ground speed of about 570 mph, the speeds were measured in mph by my GPS and confirmed later with Flightaware when I returned home, I was amazed how accurate my gps was.

John

Not really a scheduled flight, but back in the early 80's, Pan Am was going to try and fly a scheduled flight  747 from KFLL to KMIA. The idea was to pick up passengers at KFLL, with the 747 not fueled, fly to KMIA, load fuel and passengers and fly to Europe. They flew the 747 to KFLL, landed on the was then 9L and if memory serves me correctly it was either 7200 or 7600 feet in length at that time. The aircraft taxied to one of the gates, and since I had a PPL, they let me go aboard to look around while during the couple of hours it was at the gate, along with some reporters from local news stations and a TV crew. It was strange walking around the cabin of the 747, that was virtually empty. I went up to the flight deck and spoke with the crew a few minutes. I noticed that looking straight out the cockpit window, I was looking at the roof of the terminal building

 

I then went to my car and parked at the end of 9L ( you could do that then). At first the 747 taxied out to the runway threshold, and then several airport vehicles drove down the runway looking for any obstacles, or obstructions that would pose a problem for the huge aircraft during takeoff. Finally. the 747 started rolling, and it used a most of the runway, before rotating. It then made a climbing right turn, and started it's approach to KMIA at around 3000 ft agl. I bet they were busy in that cockpit going from takeoff immediately into a landing approach. since the two airports are only about  18 miles apart.  

 

The was the first and last time a 747 flew out of KFLL, they decided it wasn't worth the trouble I suppose. 

This is cargo but UPS had a scheduled flight years ago with a 747 classic from PHL-EWR.  UPS operates 2 flights from KTPA-KMCO UPS 9827 and UPS 1928 multiple days a week with an A306 and a B757. 20 minute flight.

United has been running flights from Charlottesville, VA (KCHO) to KIAD for years. 105 nm, UA blocks it at 51 minutes but most flights are 20 or so. They used to use Saab 340's but now it's 145's and RJ2's and 6000 is about as high as they get. I'm from Charlottesville originally so have been on them a few times. Flight attendants never get up.

https://flightaware.com/live/flight/UCA4932/history/20190328/1052Z/KCHO/KIAD

 

Edited March 28, 20197 yr by gsand

About 20 years ago i flew a Saab340 for a Manitoba regional and one of the legs was from The Pas (CYQD) to Flin Flon (CYFO) a distance under 50 miles. When there was no IFR traffic the initial clearance before take off  would sometimes be, "CalmAir 123 is cleared to the Flin Flon airport for an approach, not above 8000"'. Was such a nice place and time to fly. Nice machine, pleasant passengers, beautiful country and a great company to work for.

I once flew from Wash Dulles to Reagan National in the 80's.  Only passenger on board.  Scheduled flight as the aircraft final destination was a Reagan.  Flew non-stop from Tucson to Wash Dulles.  It was a 777 or 767.

31 minutes ago, Jim Young said:

I once flew from Wash Dulles to Reagan National in the 80's.  Only passenger on board.  Scheduled flight as the aircraft final destination was a Reagan.  Flew non-stop from Tucson to Wash Dulles.  It was a 777 or 767.

How was the in flight service (just kidding).....