Nonstop flight route between Ust-Kut, Irkutsk Oblast, Russia and Tonopah, Nevada, United States:

About this route:

A direct, nonstop flight between Ust-Kut Airport (UKX), Ust-Kut, Irkutsk Oblast, Russia and Tonopah Test Range Airport (XSD), Tonopah, Nevada, United States would travel a Great Circle distance of 5,443 miles (or 8,759 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 Ust-Kut Airport and Tonopah Test Range 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 Ust-Kut Airport and Tonopah Test Range 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 Ust-Kut Airport (UKX):

• Ust-Kut Airport handled 24,291 passengers last year.
• Reconstruction plan for the airport is included in the federal program of revival of significant airports, but in 2009 the airport "Ust-Kut" is "not necessarily important for the partners." Despite this, according to the General Director of JSC "Ust-Kut Airport" by Yuri Samorokov, it is expected that full-scale reconstruction would still be carried out in 2015.
• Ust-Kut Airport (UKX) currently has only 1 runway.
• ОМИ «Svetlyachok»
• The closest airport to Ust-Kut Airport (UKX) is Kirensk Airport (KCK), which is located 108 miles (173 kilometers) NE of UKX.
• The company "UTair Aviation" in 2007, becoming the controlling shareholder of the airport, announced its intention to build a new airport terminal and lengthen the runway to make a first-class aircraft.
• The furthest airport from Ust-Kut Airport (UKX) is Ushuaia International Airport (USH), which is nearly antipodal to Ust-Kut Airport (meaning Ust-Kut Airport is almost on the exact opposite side of the Earth from Ushuaia International Airport), and is located 12,167 miles (19,580 kilometers) away in Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego, Argentina.
• In addition to being known as "Ust-Kut Airport", another name for UKX is "Аэропорт Усть-Кут".

Facts about Tonopah Test Range Airport (XSD):

• The closest airport to Tonopah Test Range Airport (XSD) is Tonopah Airport (TPH), which is located 25 miles (40 kilometers) NW of XSD.
• In May 1973, when Project HAVE IDEA was initiated for joint technical and tactical evaluation of Soviet aircraft types, the tactical evaluation flights of foreign aircraft were undertaken by Detachment 1, 57th Fighter Weapons Wing.
• The furthest airport from Tonopah Test Range Airport (XSD) is Pierrefonds Airport (ZSE), which is located 11,207 miles (18,036 kilometers) away in Saint-Pierre, Réunion.
• The advent of Operation Rolling Thunder during the Vietnam War in March of 1965 led to the introduction of the obsolete and subsonic MiG-17 and the supersonic MiG-21 by the North Vietnamese Air Force being pitted against U.S.
• The earliest known depiction of the airfield was on the July 1970 Air Force Tactical Pilotage Chart.
• In the 1980s, Tonopah Airport became a major operating location for the Lockheed F-117A Nighthawk.
• The Tonopah Test Range airfield came into existence in 1957 and was used by the Department of Energy, the Air Force, and several contractors.
• What was learned during these projects prompted the US Navy to commence Top Gun exercises first at NAS Miramar, California and then NAS Fallon, Nevada.