Nonstop flight route between London, England, United Kingdom and Pituffik, Greenland:

About this route:

A direct, nonstop flight between Gatwick Airport (LGW), London, England, United Kingdom and Thule Air Base (THU), Pituffik, Greenland would travel a Great Circle distance of 2,475 miles (or 3,983 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 relatively short distance between Gatwick Airport and Thule Air Base, the route shown on this map most likely still appears to be a straight line.

Departure Airport Information:

Arrival Airport Information:

Facts about Gatwick Airport (LGW):

• Gatwick Airport handled 35,444,206 passengers last year.
• In November 1948, the airport's owners warned that it might revert to private use by November 1949.
• Queen Elizabeth II flew into Gatwick on 9 June 1958 in a de Havilland Heron of the Queen's Flight for the opening.
• The first scheduled flight departed from the Beehive terminal on 17 May 1936, bound for Paris.
• Gatwick Airport (LGW) has 2 runways.
• Caledonian Airways purchased British United Airways in November 1970, and the combined airline was initially known as Caledonian/BUA.
• On 1 April 1961, BEA began operating half its London–Paris flights from Gatwick.
• The closest airport to Gatwick Airport (LGW) is Redhill Aerodrome (KRH), which is located only 5 miles (8 kilometers) NNE of LGW.
• The furthest airport from Gatwick Airport (LGW) is Chatham Islands (CHT), which is located 11,901 miles (19,152 kilometers) away in Waitangi, Chatham Islands, New Zealand.
• Because of Gatwick Airport's relatively low elevation of 203 feet, planes can take off or land at Gatwick 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.
• From 1978 to 2008, many flights to and from the United States used Gatwick because of restrictions on the use of Heathrow implemented in the Bermuda II agreement between the UK and the US.US Airways, Gatwick's last remaining US carrier, ended service from the airport on 30 March 2013.

Facts about Thule Air Base (THU):

• In addition to being known as "Thule Air Base", another name for THU is "Thule AB".
• Thule Air Base is also home to the 821st Air Base Group and is responsible for air base support within the Thule Defense Area for the multinational population of "Team Thule." The base hosts the 12th Space Warning Squadron which operates a Ballistic Missile Early Warning System designed to detect and track ICBMs launched against North America.
• In 1949, Denmark joined NATO and abandoned its attempt to remove the United States bases.
• In 1818, Sir John Ross’s expedition made first contact with nomadic Polar Eskimos in the area.
• In the winter of 1956/57 three KC-97 tankers and alternately one of two RB-47H aircraft made polar flights to inspect Soviet defenses.
• Knud Rasmussen was the first to recognize the Pituffik plain as ideal for an airport.
• The closest airport to Thule Air Base (THU) is Savissivik Heliport (SVR), which is located 69 miles (111 kilometers) ESE of THU.
• Thule is the location where the fastest recorded sea level surface wind speed in the world was measured when a peak speed of 333 kilometres per hour was recorded on 8 March 1972 prior to the instrument's destruction.
• The furthest airport from Thule Air Base (THU) is Hobart International Airport (HBA), which is located 9,883 miles (15,905 kilometers) away in Hobart, Tasmania, Australia.