Nonstop flight route between Skopje, Macedonia and Grand Forks, North Dakota, United States:

About this route:

A direct, nonstop flight between Skopje Airport (SKP), Skopje, Macedonia and Grand Forks Air Force Base (RDR), Grand Forks, North Dakota, United States would travel a Great Circle distance of 5,198 miles (or 8,365 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 Skopje Airport and Grand Forks Air Force Base, 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 Skopje Airport and Grand Forks Air Force Base. 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 Skopje Airport (SKP):

• Skopje Airport handled 98,440 passengers last year.
• In 2008 the Macedonian Government signed a contract with the Turkish company Tepe Akfen Ventures for a twenty-year long concession during which this company would manage Macedonia's two existing airports - the Skopje Alexander the Great Airport and the St.
• The closest airport to Skopje Airport (SKP) is Pristina International Airport "Adem Jashari" (PRN), which is located 52 miles (84 kilometers) NW of SKP.
• After the Second World War, Aeroput was replaced by JAT Yugoslav Airlines, which linked Skopje to a number of domestic and international destinations until the dissolution of Yugoslavia in the early 1990s.
• The first commercial flights in Skopje were introduced in 1929 when the Yugoslav carrier Aeroput introduced a route linking the city with the capital, Belgrade.
• The furthest airport from Skopje Airport (SKP) is Chatham Islands (CHT), which is located 11,514 miles (18,530 kilometers) away in Waitangi, Chatham Islands, New Zealand.
• Skopje Airport (SKP) currently has only 1 runway.
• Because of Skopje Airport's relatively low elevation of 781 feet, planes can take off or land at Skopje 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.
• In December 2006 the government of the Republic of Macedonia announced plans to rename the airport after Alexander the Great, sparking a renewed diplomatic spat with Greece, because both countries consider Alexander the Great as part of their own heritage.
• In addition to being known as "Skopje Airport", other names for SKP include "Аеродром Скопје" and "Aerodrom Skopje".

Facts about Grand Forks Air Force Base (RDR):

• 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.
• 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.
• 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.
• In addition to being known as "Grand Forks Air Force Base", another name for RDR is "Grand Forks AFB".
• 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.
• Grand Forks Air Force Base was established on 1 December 1955, with construction beginning in the fall of that year.
• On 1 February 1993, ACC dropped the 319th Bomb Wing's primary nuclear mission and gave the wing the primary mission of B-1B conventional bombardment operations.