Nonstop flight route between Kaikoura, New Zealand and Sofia, Bulgaria:

About this route:

A direct, nonstop flight between Kaikoura Aerodrome (KBZ), Kaikoura, New Zealand and Sofia Airport Vrazhdebna (SOF), Sofia, Bulgaria would travel a Great Circle distance of 10,928 miles (or 17,586 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 Kaikoura Aerodrome and Sofia Airport Vrazhdebna, 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 Kaikoura Aerodrome and Sofia Airport Vrazhdebna. 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 Kaikoura Aerodrome (KBZ):

• Because of Kaikoura Aerodrome's relatively low elevation of 19 feet, planes can take off or land at Kaikoura Aerodrome 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.
• Kaikoura Aerodrome is an uncontrolled aerodrome located 4 nautical miles southwest of Kaikoura on the South Island of New Zealand.
• The furthest airport from Kaikoura Aerodrome (KBZ) is León Airport (LEN), which is nearly antipodal to Kaikoura Aerodrome (meaning Kaikoura Aerodrome is almost on the exact opposite side of the Earth from León Airport), and is located 12,397 miles (19,952 kilometers) away in León, Spain.
• The aerodrome is operated by Kaikoura District Council and is available for general use without the permission of the operator.
• The closest airport to Kaikoura Aerodrome (KBZ) is Woodbourne Airport (BHE), which is located 64 miles (103 kilometers) NNE of KBZ.
• Kaikoura Aerodrome (KBZ) has 2 runways.

Facts about Sofia Airport Vrazhdebna (SOF):

• The closest airport to Sofia Airport Vrazhdebna (SOF) is Plovdiv Airport (PDV), which is located 86 miles (138 kilometers) ESE of SOF.
• The furthest airport from Sofia Airport Vrazhdebna (SOF) is Chatham Islands (CHT), which is located 11,437 miles (18,405 kilometers) away in Waitangi, Chatham Islands, New Zealand.
• Sofia Airport Vrazhdebna (SOF) currently has only 1 runway.
• In addition to being known as "Sofia Airport Vrazhdebna", other names for SOF include "Vrazhdebna Airport" and "Летище София".
• The airport was initially built in the late 1930s on a site 6.3 km by road then.
• The terminal had substantially reached its capacity of some 600,000 passengers a year by the later 1960s and was subjected to a number of refurbishments and extensions beginning in the spring of 1968.
• The passenger terminal building is designed with a capacity of 2,000 peak hour passengers or up to 2.6 million passengers a year, plus 26,000 tonnes of luggage.
• Service life of the new airport control tower will be more than 40 years and is designed to serve the airport with a possible extension.
• Sofia Airport Vrazhdebna handled 350,432 passengers last year.
• A lot of consideration has been given to the design of the layout, the functional definition of the working positions, the operations room surface area for ANS provision and meteorological observation, as well as to the requirements for visibility to the runway and the approaches and access to an open observation platform.