Nonstop flight route between Berlin, Germany and Santa Barbara, California, United States:

About this route:

A direct, nonstop flight between Royal Air Force Station Gatow (GWW), Berlin, Germany and Santa Barbara Airport (SBA), Santa Barbara, California, United States would travel a Great Circle distance of 5,799 miles (or 9,332 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 Royal Air Force Station Gatow and Santa Barbara 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 Royal Air Force Station Gatow and Santa Barbara 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 Royal Air Force Station Gatow (GWW):

• To commemorate Australian participation in the Airlift, the Royal Australian Air Force presented RAF Gatow with a retired Douglas Dakota in the 1980s, to use as a gate guardian.
• Following the reunification of Germany, the British ceded control of Gatow Airport on 18 June 1994, and it was handed back to the German Air Force on 7 September 1994.
• The closest airport to Royal Air Force Station Gatow (GWW) is Berlin Tegel Airport (TXL), which is located only 9 miles (14 kilometers) NE of GWW.
• Late April 1945, towards the end of World War II in Europe, the airfield was occupied by the advancing Red Army.
• The RAF Gatow Station Flight used two De Havilland Chipmunk T10s, one of which is now in the Alliiertenmuseum, to maintain and exercise the British legal right under the Potsdam Agreement to use the airspace over both West and East Berlin, as well as the air corridors to and from West Germany to the city.
• During the Berlin Airlift, the Station was modernised with a 2,000 yards long concrete runway, using 794 German workers, in March 1947.
• On 20 June 1980, the Royal Australian Air Force presented a Douglas Dakota to RAF Gatow in commemoration of its role.
• The furthest airport from Royal Air Force Station Gatow (GWW) is Chatham Islands (CHT), which is located 11,694 miles (18,819 kilometers) away in Waitangi, Chatham Islands, New Zealand.
• RAF Gatow has the unique and unlikely distinction of being the base for the only known operational use of flying boats in central Europe, during the Berlin Blockade, on the nearby Großer Wannsee in the Havel river.
• Royal Air Force Station Gatow (GWW) currently has only 1 runway.
• Because of Royal Air Force Station Gatow's relatively low elevation of 161 feet, planes can take off or land at Royal Air Force Station Gatow at a lower air speed than at airports located at a higher elevation. This is because the air density is higher closer to sea level than it would otherwise be at higher elevations.

Facts about Santa Barbara Airport (SBA):

• Santa Barbara Airport (SBA) has 3 runways.
• As airplane manufacturing grew in the late 1930s that airstrip developed into an airfield.
• In the 1980s Apollo Airways, a commuter airline based in Santa Barbara that changed its name to Pacific Coast Airlines, flew Handley Page HP.137 Jetstreams from the airport.
• Because of Santa Barbara Airport's relatively low elevation of 10 feet, planes can take off or land at Santa Barbara Airport at a lower air speed than at airports located at a higher elevation. This is because the air density is higher closer to sea level than it would otherwise be at higher elevations.
• The closest airport to Santa Barbara Airport (SBA) is Santa Ynez Airport (SQA), which is located only 18 miles (29 kilometers) NW of SBA.
• The largest passenger jet currently serving Santa Barbara is the Airbus A319 operated by Frontier Airlines nonstop to Denver.
• On August 18, 2011 the airport opened a new 72,000 square foot terminal to add to the single story terminal built by United Airlines in 1942.
• The furthest airport from Santa Barbara Airport (SBA) is Pierrefonds Airport (ZSE), which is located 11,487 miles (18,486 kilometers) away in Saint-Pierre, Réunion.
• Until 2002 Santa Barbara Airport was on a mainline jet aircraft route between San Francisco and Los Angeles.