Nonstop flight route between Cold Lake, Alberta, Canada and St Athan, Wales, United Kingdom:

About this route:

A direct, nonstop flight between CFB Cold Lake (YOD), Cold Lake, Alberta, Canada and MoD St Athan (DGX), St Athan, Wales, United Kingdom would travel a Great Circle distance of 4,006 miles (or 6,446 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 CFB Cold Lake and MoD St Athan, 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 CFB Cold Lake and MoD St Athan. 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 CFB Cold Lake (YOD):

• The furthest airport from CFB Cold Lake (YOD) is Tôlanaro Airport (FTU), which is located 10,097 miles (16,250 kilometers) away in Tôlanaro, Madagascar.
• Personnel arrived at Cold Lake on March 31, 1954, with operations at RCAF Station Cold Lake beginning that day.
• The closest airport to CFB Cold Lake (YOD) is Bonnyville Airport (YBY), which is located only 20 miles (32 kilometers) WSW of YOD.
• In addition to being known as "CFB Cold Lake", another name for YOD is "Cold Lake/Group Captain R.W. McNair Airport".
• "The relatively unrestricted Cold Lake Air Weapons Range represents one of the largest live-drop training ranges in the world and is the largest low-level flying area in North America.
• CLAWR is the northern equivalent to the United States Air Force's Nellis Air Force Range and provides a different training environment with heavy boreal forest and numerous lakes more closely resembling European terrain.
• CFB Cold Lake (YOD) has 3 runways.
• On February 1, 1968, the RCAF merged with the Royal Canadian Navy and Canadian Army to form the unified Canadian Forces.

Facts about MoD St Athan (DGX):

• Because of MoD St Athan's relatively low elevation of 163 feet, planes can take off or land at MoD St Athan 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 closest airport to MoD St Athan (DGX) is Cardiff Airport (CWL), which is located only 4 miles (6 kilometers) E of DGX.
• MoD St Athan (DGX) currently has only 1 runway.
• The MOD later decided that DARA's 'Fast Jets' and 'Engines' businesses would close by April 2007, although the 'Large Aircraft' business would continue and, on 14 April 2005, the Project Red Dragon super-hangar opened and DARA moved its VC10 operations from its existing 'Twin Peaks' hangar into the new facility.
• During the war a dummy airfield was built using wood and cardboard a few miles west of the original airfield and successful efforts were made to hide the proper field.
• The furthest airport from MoD St Athan (DGX) is Dunedin International Airport (DUD), which is located 11,960 miles (19,248 kilometers) away in Dunedin, Otago, New Zealand.
• The training to be carried out at St Athan was to be specialist phase 2 and phase 3 engineering courses of the Royal Navy, Army and Royal Air Force.
• On 26 August 1993 an ATC civilian instructor was seriously injured and the RAF Volunteer Reserve pilot, Group Captain Roger Sweatman, was killed when their Chipmunk trainer, on an air experience flight, crashed after encountering difficulties during a simulated emergency low-height manoeuvre on take-off.