Over the years, the world of long-haul air travel has changed immensely for passengers across the planet. With intercontinental journeys having initially been arduous multi-leg and multi-day affairs, the advent of the jet age brought the world closer together, with quadjets such as the Douglas DC-8 and the Boeing 707 able to fly further than their predecessors. Widebodies like the Boeing 747 soon followed.
With the 747 being joined by twin-aisle trijets such as the McDonnell Douglas DC-10 and the Lockheed L-1011 TriStar, it was long accepted that only aircraft with three or four engines could operate long intercontinental flights across the world's major oceans. However, ETOPS unlocked long-haul flying for widebody twinjets such as the Airbus A330, Boeing 767, and Boeing 777 families in the late 20th century. These aircraft have since been succeeded by new widebodies such as the Airbus A330neo, A350, Boeing 787, and, shortly, the 777X, with twin-aisle twinjets now considered the norm on long-haul flights as quadjets have become a rarity.
However, recent developments have also seen increased narrowbody twinjet usage on intercontinental flights, with several routes exceeding 4,000 miles this year. The longest of the lot According to current scheduling data made available by Cirium , an aviation analytics company, there are six routes in excess of 4,000 miles that will see narrowbody service in 2025. The longest of these by distance clocks in at 4,074 miles (6,556.
5 km) in lengt.
