Nonstop flight route between Grand Forks, North Dakota, United States and Torrejón de Ardoz, Spain:

About this route:

A direct, nonstop flight between Grand Forks Air Force Base (RDR), Grand Forks, North Dakota, United States and Madrid–Torrejón Airport (TOJ), Torrejón de Ardoz, Spain would travel a Great Circle distance of 4,383 miles (or 7,054 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 Madrid–Torrejón 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 Grand Forks Air Force Base and Madrid–Torrejón 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 Grand Forks Air Force Base (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.
• 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.
• In addition to being known as "Grand Forks Air Force Base", another name for RDR is "Grand Forks AFB".
• With the restructuring of the Air Force and the disestablishment of SAC in 1992, the wing transferred to Air Combat Command, then came under Air Force Space Command in 1993.
• In 1973, the 319th Bomb Wing acquired the AGM-69 Short Range Attack Missile, replacing the older AGM-28 Hound Dog air-to-ground missile aboard its B-52H aircraft.
• 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.
• 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.
• 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.

Facts about Madrid–Torrejón Airport (TOJ):

• In accordance with the 1988 agreement, the USAF portion of the base was returned to the Spanish government on 21 May 1996, with the 401st Tactical Fighter Wing being transferred to Aviano Air Base, Italy without personnel or equipment.
• The closest airport to Madrid–Torrejón Airport (TOJ) is Adolfo Suárez Madrid–Barajas Airport[1] (MAD), which is located only 6 miles (10 kilometers) WSW of TOJ.
• In addition to being known as "Madrid–Torrejón Airport", other names for TOJ include "Aeropuerto de Madrid/Barajas", "Torrejón Air Base" and "Base Aérea de Torrejón".
• As the time approached in 1987 for the renegotiation of the existing base agreement, which had entered into force in 1983 for a five-year period, pressures mounted for a reduction of the United States military presence in Spain.
• The furthest airport from Madrid–Torrejón Airport (TOJ) is Palmerston North Airport (PMR), which is nearly antipodal to Madrid–Torrejón Airport (meaning Madrid–Torrejón Airport is almost on the exact opposite side of the Earth from Palmerston North Airport), and is located 12,386 miles (19,933 kilometers) away in Palmerston North, New Zealand.
• The outcome of the 1986 referendum on membership in NATO committed the Spanish government to negotiate the reduction of the United States military presence in Spain.
• Madrid–Torrejón Airport is a commercial airport in Spain.
• Implementation of this agreement was delayed by the 1990–91 crisis in Kuwait, when the 401st TFW was one of the first American fighter wings to respond, with the 612th TFS deploying to its wartime base at Incirlik Turkey and the 614th TFS becoming the first US military unit to deploy to the Persian Gulf State of Qatar.
• Madrid–Torrejón Airport (TOJ) currently has only 1 runway.