Nonstop flight route between Anchorage, Alaska, United States and Zürich, Switzerland:

About this route:

A direct, nonstop flight between Elmendorf Air Force Base (EDF), Anchorage, Alaska, United States and Zurich Airport (ZRH), Zürich, Switzerland would travel a Great Circle distance of 4,829 miles (or 7,772 kilometers).

A Great Circle is the shortest distance between 2 points on a sphere. Because most world maps are flat (but the Earth is round), the route of the shortest distance between 2 points on the Earth will often appear curved when viewed on a flat map, especially for long distances. If you were to simply draw a straight line on a flat map and measure a very long distance, it would likely be much further than if you were to lay a string between those two points on a globe. Because of the large distance between Elmendorf Air Force Base and Zurich Airport, the route shown on this map most likely appears curved because of this reason.

Try it at home! Get a globe and tightly lay a string between Elmendorf Air Force Base and Zurich Airport. You'll see that it will travel the same route of the red line on this map!

Departure Airport Information:

Arrival Airport Information:

Facts about Elmendorf Air Force Base (EDF):

• The adjacent facilities were officially combined by the 2005 Base Closure and Realignment Commission.
• The Elmendorf AFB is a site of one of the now decommissioned FLR-9 Wullenweber-class antennas, a node of the now obsolete High Frequency SIGINT direction finding system.
• In addition to being known as "Elmendorf Air Force Base", another name for EDF is "JB Elmendorf-Richardson".
• The Department of Defense proposed a major realignment of the base as part of the Base Realignment and Closure program announced on 13 May 2005.
• The furthest airport from Elmendorf Air Force Base (EDF) is Port Elizabeth International Airport (PLZ), which is located 10,542 miles (16,965 kilometers) away in Port Elizabeth, South Africa.
• The late 1950s, 1960s, and early 1970s brought about a gradual, but significant decline in air defense forces in Alaska due to mission changes and the demands of the Vietnam War.
• Elmendorf Air Force Base is a United States military facility in Anchorage, the largest city in Alaska.
• The closest airport to Elmendorf Air Force Base (EDF) is Merrill Field (MRI), which is located only 3 miles (5 kilometers) SSW of EDF.
• Following World War II, Elmendorf assumed an increasing role in the defense of North America as the uncertain wartime relations between the United States and the Soviet Union deteriorated into the Cold War.

Facts about Zurich Airport (ZRH):

• The first flights off the west runway were not until 1948.
• In addition to being known as "Zurich Airport", another name for ZRH is "Flughafen Zürich".
• Zurich Airport railway station is located underneath the terminal.
• Zurich Airport handled 24,865,138 passengers last year.
• In 2003, Zurich Airport completed a major expansion project in which it built a new parking garage, a new midfield terminal, and an automated underground train to link the midfield terminal to the main terminal.
• Zurich Airport (ZRH) has 4 runways.
• The furthest airport from Zurich Airport (ZRH) is Chatham Islands (CHT), which is nearly antipodal to Zurich Airport (meaning Zurich Airport is almost on the exact opposite side of the Earth from Chatham Islands), and is located 12,087 miles (19,453 kilometers) away in Waitangi, Chatham Islands, New Zealand.
• The closest airport to Zurich Airport (ZRH) is Emmen Swiss Air Base (EML), which is located 28 miles (45 kilometers) SSW of ZRH.
• In front of the terminal is a regional bus station and the airport stop of the Stadtbahn Glattal, a light rail system.
• Schengen and non-Schengen arriving passengers are handled in separate areas of the central airside building, with non-Schengen passengers passing through immigration controls to reach the ground-side terminal complex.