nomad1974

obscure
• adjective (obscurer, obscurest) 1 not discovered or known about; uncertain. 2 not well known. 3 not clearly expressed or easily understood. 4 hard to make out; indistinct.

(Source: Compact Oxford English Dictionary)

Anyway, we can agree to disagree on this one. I can think (or not!) of many other routes that are more "obscure" than ICN-TAS.

mecabq

Very interesting historical tidbit, thank you. I learn something new every day on FlyerTalk.

crimson2k6

Lufthansa actually operates multiple flights per week MUC-TAS as well. Though MUC is not Germany's capital, its one of LH's hubs, so it makes some sense to have the route. It's still one of the odder ones though.

Does anybody have a sense for the types of passengers on this route? Is it mostly Uzbeki expats living in Germany or oil/gas/natural resource business men?

dabears1020

Westjet operates a Comox, BC-Puerto Vallarta flight. I get that it's obviously a vacation route, but it just seems odd for such a long flight to come out of such a tiny airport.

CZBB

I'll address these
#1) Do you have any idea how many tech workers go from from Dell and other companies in AUS to other tech companies in SJC? This flight is actually called (and advertised as) "The nerd bird". AA dropped the route last year, and AS jumped all over it. (flight actually is PDX-SJC-AUS which nicely connects with Intel in Portland/Hillsboro)
#2) LAS-STS. QX (Horizon) have built a nice little business out of STS. LAS is just another city with a fair bit of AS service.
#3) Don't think of it as the "Bellingham" airport, think of it as the "Vancouver(Bellingham)" airport. From my house in metro Vancouver, it's only 30 mins further to BLI. Also this flight exists because AS didn't want to lose all the business to G4(Allegiant), who have up to 5x daily BLI-LAS

As for all the others, they're part of circle routes like LAX-RDM-EUG-LAX.

hfly

and you can also fly CX BKK-BOM or BOM-DXB or both. So what. You an also fly SQ TPE-LAX. SAA had/has JFL-Sal Island, Sao Tome everyday. You can fly SQ FRA-NYC, or MH JFK-STO. I used to fly OK DXB-CMB.

CZBB

Not really. It serves the whole island excepting Victoria, as the runways at YCD & YBL just aren't long enough for that sort of stuff, and YQQ's 10,000' works nicely. YQQ is also a (full) international alternate for filing flight plans from non-US destinations, as it's one of the very few airports in the southwest corner of BC with a long runway (YXX being the other). YYJ will get there when they get the 1400' extension, but it's pretty iffy at 7000' and in when YVR gets snow, diverting to YYJ can be a bit of an issue (as KL learned when they used 6990' of the 7000' in a snowstorm in the early 90s).

CZBB

Oh come on, let's go closer to home. How about YVR-LAS on PR (with full traffic rights), or CX's YVR-JFK

nerd

But why on earth would you ever consider those obscure city pairs?

DXB-BOM? TPE-LAX, FRA-NYC? Really?

Mr H

I guess that since most airlines try to operate as commercial ventures, there are going to be reasons to justify most routes. Routes are only obscure until we discover the reasons...

PIONEER

Delta used to have some interesting mainline routes from BHM to DFW with stops in Baton Rouge, Jackson, Shreveport, and/or Monroe (the original home of DL).

Also, Eastern flew from the NW (not sure if it was SEA or PDX) to OMA in the 70's.

derteilzeitberliner

Of course, you've got the oil business. Germany is the first foreign investor in this area.

As for the Uzbekis in Germany, the same applies than to Koreans: Until WW2, ethnic Germans lived on the shores of the Volga. Stalin got them deported to Central Asia. After 1990, many managed to secure emigration to Germany but a lot "commute" for business purposes between their former and new countries.

If I'm not mistaken, Uzbekistan Airways does fly direct to either TXL or SXF for the same reason.

gliere

Several years ago NW used to fly MSN-LAS nonstop, primarily to drive Allegiant out of town, which they did, then reduced the flight to 2x weekly, then dropped it.

DL currently flies MSN-DCA, which isn't necessarily an obscure route (state capital to national capital), but it is one of the few stand-alone non hub-to-hub routes out there.

hfly

Nerd, the point was that I don't other than the fact that they are operated by CATHAY PACIFIC under fifth freedom rights.

nerd

Yeah - it seemed to be a list of 5th freedom flights. That's why I wondered where they fit into the obscure routes discussion.

My apologies for the confusion.