To be stuck in the middle seat!

Last week, the world’s longest haul flight took off. This was Qatar Airways and the flight was non-stop 17 hours, 30 minutes one-way from Doha, Qatar to Auckland, New Zealand, over a distance of 14,539 kilometers. Imagine being stuck in the middle seat on this flight! Horror of horrors!

This brings to mind the world’s first ever long haul flight – this was KLM and the flight took off from Amsterdam, flying to Batavia then, which is recognized as Jakarta today. This flight used to operate before the beginning of the World War II after which it was stopped.

It took 6 days to complete this one-way journey but it was not non-stop; every 100 miles or so, the flight halted. In fact 6 days journey had 15 to 20 intermediate stops. So one did not get bored being stuck in one plane all the time but surely one got tired of getting in and out of the flight so many times; not to mention the take offs and landings!

Thankfully we have come a long way but flights are indeed getting longer. Watching TV, catching up on work, sleeping, chatting, reading; you can only do so much for over 17 hours. Thus as flights get ultra long haul, we need to come up with creative ways and means to keep our minds occupied for so long. Oh the pressures of modern day life