Nonstop flight route between Helsinki / Vantaa, Finland and Tampa, Florida, United States:

About this route:

A direct, nonstop flight between Helsinki Airport (HEL), Helsinki / Vantaa, Finland and MacDill Air Force Base (MCF), Tampa, Florida, United States would travel a Great Circle distance of 5,118 miles (or 8,237 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 Helsinki Airport and MacDill Air Force Base, 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 Helsinki Airport and MacDill Air Force Base. 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 Helsinki Airport (HEL):

• In addition to being known as "Helsinki Airport", another name for HEL is "Helsinki-Vantaan lentoasemaHelsingfors-Vanda flygplats".
• Helsinki Airport (HEL) has 3 runways.
• The closest airport to Helsinki Airport (HEL) is Helsinki-Malmi Airport (HEM), which is located only 5 miles (8 kilometers) SSE of HEL.
• The airport's three runways provide a platform for future growth while the airport can accommodate wide-body aircraft such as the Airbus A340.
• Helsinki Airport handled 15,279,043 passengers last year.
• The furthest airport from Helsinki Airport (HEL) is Chatham Islands (CHT), which is located 10,992 miles (17,689 kilometers) away in Waitangi, Chatham Islands, New Zealand.
• The construction of the Ring Rail Line rail link to the airport was started in May 2009, with an opening for traffic projected for mid-2015.
• Because of Helsinki Airport's relatively low elevation of 179 feet, planes can take off or land at Helsinki 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.
• In 2013 Finavia announced plans to expand the airport to serve up to 20 million passenger by 2020.

Facts about MacDill Air Force Base (MCF):

• The closest airport to MacDill Air Force Base (MCF) is Peter O. Knight Airport (TPF), which is located only 6 miles (10 kilometers) NE of MCF.
• The 6 AMW also has a collocated "Associate" wing at MacDill, the 927th Air Refueling Wing of the Air Force Reserve Command.
• Two secondary Army Airfields, Brooksville Army Airfield and Hillsborough Army Airfield were built and opened in early 1942 to support the flight operations of MacDill and Drew Fields.
• With the United States entry into World War II, the primary mission of MacDill Field became the training of bombardment units under III Bomber Command.
• After the war in Europe had broken out in September 1939, fears of Nazi U-Boats attacking American shipping in the Gulf of Mexico was the concern of the War Department.
• Several bases in Florida, including MacDill, served as detention centers for German prisoners-of-war in the latter part of 1944 and 1945.
• The furthest airport from MacDill Air Force Base (MCF) is Shark Bay Airport (MJK), which is located 11,436 miles (18,405 kilometers) away in Monkey Mia, Western Australia, Australia.
• Estimates of the number of crew members trained at the base during the war vary from 50,000 to 120,000, with as many as 15,000 troops were stationed at MacDill Field at one time.
• In addition to the antisubmarine mission, another prewar mission of MacDill was "Project X" the ferrying of combat aircraft eastward to the Philippines via ferrying routes set up by Ferrying Command over South Atlantic Ocean and Central Africa.
• In addition to being known as "MacDill Air Force Base", another name for MCF is "MacDill AFB".