Nonstop flight route between Grand Forks, North Dakota, United States and Oxfordshire, England, United Kingdom:

About this route:

A direct, nonstop flight between Grand Forks Air Force Base (RDR), Grand Forks, North Dakota, United States and RAF Brize Norton (BZZ), Oxfordshire, England, United Kingdom would travel a Great Circle distance of 3,954 miles (or 6,364 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 Grand Forks Air Force Base and RAF Brize Norton, 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 Grand Forks Air Force Base and RAF Brize Norton. 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 Grand Forks Air Force Base (RDR):

• The 4133d SW was redesignated as the 319th Bombardment Wing on 1 February 1963 in a name-only redesigation and was assigned to SAC's Second Air Force, 810th Strategic Aerospace Division.
• Following the departure of the last B-1B aircraft in 1994, the base transferred to the new Air Mobility Command and the 319th Bomb Wing was redesignated as the 319th Air Refueling Wing.
• Opened 57 years ago in early 1957, the base's current host unit is the 319th Air Base Wing assigned to the Expeditionary Center of the Air Mobility Command.
• Survey teams selected sites in flat wheatlands close to the Canada-Minnesota border, north-northwest of Grand Forks.
• Grand Forks Air Force Base was established on 1 December 1955, with construction beginning in the fall of that year.
• On 3 November 1967, the Department of Defense revealed that GFAFB was one of 10 initial locations to host a Sentinel Anti-Ballistic Missile site.
• On 26 May 1972, President Nixon and Soviet general secretary Leonid Brezhnev signed the ABM Treaty, which limited each nation to one site to protect strategic forces and one site to protect the "National Command Authority." With work about 85 percent complete at Grand Forks, the United States chose to finish construction at the North Dakota site.
• The closest airport to Grand Forks Air Force Base (RDR) is Grand Forks International Airport (GFK), which is located only 10 miles (17 kilometers) E of RDR.
• The furthest airport from Grand Forks Air Force Base (RDR) is Margaret River Airport (MGV), which is located 10,504 miles (16,904 kilometers) away in Margaret River, Western Australia, Australia.
• SAGE operations were extremely expansive and GFADS was inactivated on 1 December 1963, when it was merged with the Minot Air Defense Sector at Minot AFB to the west.
• In addition to being known as "Grand Forks Air Force Base", another name for RDR is "Grand Forks AFB".

Facts about RAF Brize Norton (BZZ):

• RAF Brize Norton Flying Club resides at the station providing low cost flying for MOD personnel and training to PPL level and above.
• The closest airport to RAF Brize Norton (BZZ) is RAF Fairford (FFD), which is located only 10 miles (16 kilometers) WSW of BZZ.
• In 1970 two squadrons 99 Squadron and 511 Squadron operating the Bristol Britannia moved from RAF Lyneham.
• By the 1950s Cold War tension was escalating and the United States envisaged stationing nuclear bombers in the United Kingdom as a deterrent to Soviet aggression.
• By March 2011, 70 buildings had been refurbished on the station.
• The furthest airport from RAF Brize Norton (BZZ) is Dunedin International Airport (DUD), which is located 11,888 miles (19,132 kilometers) away in Dunedin, Otago, New Zealand.
• To accommodate this expansion, a major infrastructure redevelopment, "Programme Future Brize" was established in 2009.