Nonstop flight route between Helsinki / Vantaa, Finland and Butterworth, South Africa:

About this route:

A direct, nonstop flight between Helsinki Airport (HEL), Helsinki / Vantaa, Finland and RMAF Butterworth (UTE), Butterworth, South Africa would travel a Great Circle distance of 5,394 miles (or 8,681 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 RMAF Butterworth, 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 RMAF Butterworth. 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):

• Helsinki Airport handled 15,279,043 passengers last year.
• In 2013 Finavia announced plans to expand the airport to serve up to 20 million passenger by 2020.
• The airport is nominally divided into 2 terminals, located 250 metres apart and linked by an internal pedestrian connection both airside and landside.
• 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 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.
• Helsinki Airport or Helsinki-Vantaa Airport is the main international airport of the Helsinki metropolitan region and the whole of Finland.
• 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.
• 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 addition to being known as "Helsinki Airport", another name for HEL is "Helsinki-Vantaan lentoasemaHelsingfors-Vanda flygplats".

Facts about RMAF Butterworth (UTE):

• In 1957, the RAF closed the station and it was transferred to the Royal Australian Air Force and it was promptly renamed as RAAF Station Butterworth, becoming the home to numerous Australian fighter and bomber squadrons stationed in Malaya during the Cold War era.
• The furthest airport from RMAF Butterworth (UTE) is Cap. FAP Guillermo Concha Iberico International Airport (PIU), which is nearly antipodal to RMAF Butterworth (meaning RMAF Butterworth is almost on the exact opposite side of the Earth from Cap. FAP Guillermo Concha Iberico International Airport), and is located 12,365 miles (19,900 kilometers) away in Piura, Peru.
• Because of RMAF Butterworth's relatively low elevation of 8 feet, planes can take off or land at RMAF Butterworth 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.
• RAF Butterworth was officially opened in October 1941, as a Royal Air Force station which was a part of the British defence plan for defending the Malayan Peninsula against an imminent threat of invasion by the Imperial Japanese forces during World War II.
• In addition to being known as "RMAF Butterworth", other names for UTE include "TUDM Butterworth", "BWH" and "WMKB".
• RMAF Butterworth (UTE) currently has only 1 runway.
• The closest airport to RMAF Butterworth (UTE) is RMAF Butterworth (BWH), which is located only 0 mile (0 kilometer) N of UTE.