Nonstop flight route between Falkland Islands and Essex (near London), England, United Kingdom:

About this route:

A direct, nonstop flight between RAF Mount Pleasant (MPN), Falkland Islands and London Stansted Airport (STN), Essex (near London), England, United Kingdom would travel a Great Circle distance of 7,935 miles (or 12,770 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 RAF Mount Pleasant and London Stansted 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 RAF Mount Pleasant and London Stansted 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 RAF Mount Pleasant (MPN):

• The closest airport to RAF Mount Pleasant (MPN) is Port Stanley Airport (PSY), which is located 30 miles (49 kilometers) ENE of MPN.
• On 10 November 2011, it was announced that Prince William would be serving as a Sea King pilot on the station for six weeks during February and March 2012.
• Flights of Phantoms were rotated through the airfield until 1992 when they were replaced with Tornado F3s.
• The British government felt that Stanley airfield was not the best option for a large, permanent station and decided to construct a new RAF station and make it the centrepiece of considerably strengthened air defences for the Falkland Islands, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands.
• The furthest airport from RAF Mount Pleasant (MPN) is Mohe Gulian Airport (OHE), which is nearly antipodal to RAF Mount Pleasant (meaning RAF Mount Pleasant is almost on the exact opposite side of the Earth from Mohe Gulian Airport), and is located 12,353 miles (19,879 kilometers) away in Mohe, Heilongjiang, China.
• Using the IATA airport code MPN, RAF Mount Pleasant also acts as the Falkland Islands' only international airport, along with its military role.
• There is also a Joint Communications Unit providing the electronic warfare and command and control systems for the Royal Navy, British Army and Royal Air Force.
• Additionally, every Saturday LAN Airlines operates a scheduled commercial flight to Presidente Carlos Ibáñez del Campo International Airport of the Punta Arenas city in southern Chile, stopping at Río Gallegos, Argentina once a month.

Facts about London Stansted Airport (STN):

• The top international destinations served by Stansted airport are in Ireland, Italy, Poland and Spain.
• Stansted also had scheduled and charter flights to Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver, but these flights to Canada have now ceased.
• The furthest airport from London Stansted Airport (STN) is Chatham Islands (CHT), which is located 11,858 miles (19,084 kilometers) away in Waitangi, Chatham Islands, New Zealand.
• The closest airport to London Stansted Airport (STN) is MDPGA Wethersfield (WXF), which is located only 13 miles (21 kilometers) ENE of STN.
• London Stansted Airport (STN) currently has only 1 runway.
• Because of London Stansted Airport's relatively low elevation of 348 feet, planes can take off or land at London Stansted 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 terminal building was designed by Foster Associates with input from the structural engineer Peter Rice and features a "floating" roof, supported by a space frame of inverted-pyramid roof trusses, creating the impression of a stylised swan in flight.
• London Stansted Airport handled 17,852,393 passengers last year.
• In November 2006 Uttlesford District Council rejected a BAA planning application to increase the permitted number of aircraft movements and to remove the limit on passenger numbers.
• The airfield opened in 1943 and was used during the Second World War as RAF Stansted Mountfitchet by the Royal Air Force and the United States Army Air Forces as a bomber airfield and as a major maintenance depot.
• Long haul transatlantic operations made a return to Stansted in June 2010, when Sun Country Airlines announced a seasonal weekly service from Stansted to Minneapolis.
• In 2007 passenger numbers peaked at nearly 24 million, but then declined for 5 years and in 2012 the total was around 17.5 million.