I recently flew Washington Dulles to Beijing on UAL, not quite over the pole. The flight path goes over siberia and then into Mongolia, with a last minute (or hour) jog south east into Beijing. Same thing on the return. Flight goes northwest to mongolia and then makes a 45-degree turn and heads pretty much north.

Does UAL have some limit that they have to take the most direct route out of Chinese airspace? It seems that the most direct route would be to fly basically north (or NNE) out of Beijing instead (and same coming in).



(Long-time reader, first time post since all my questions are generally answered!)