An Emirates Plane Just Made the World’s Longest Direct Commercial Flight

An Emirates Airbus A380 flew into the record books on Wednesday when it landed in Auckland after completing the world’s longest direct commercial flight.

The journey, which began some 8,824 miles away in Dubai, overshot Qantas’ Sydney-to-Dallas flight by about 250 miles, according to the Guardian.

The return journey on the Middle Eastern carrier, from Auckland to Dubai, will also be the longest by flight time, at about 17 hours and 15 minutes. But Emirates will break this record again when it launches the 17-hour-and-35-minute service between Dubai and Panama City later this month.

But both of these flights fall short of the now-defunct Singapore Airlines route between the Southeast Asian island and Newark, N.J., that took nearly 19 hours.

[Guardian]