Flight path -- IAD-PEK
 

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!)

My understanding is that China only has a very few flight corridors available for civil carriers in its airspace. As a result you get some very strange and often indirect routings into or through Chinese airspace.

P.S. Welcome to FT!!!

Thanks for the welcome!

Interesting . . . from the inseat map system it certainly looked like the most direct route out of China at least, although definitely not the most direct route to the U.S.

Welcome to FlyerTalk!!

In addition to "most direct" there is also "most efficient" that has to be considered when flying such long routes. Because of the way the jet stream runs it is frequently better for the planes leaving the NE to go a bit east, up the coast of Canada rather than flying direct on the great circle path.

And the airspace issues also contribute to routing issues. It is even more entertaining when you hear the ATC chatter where the controllers are offering early departures and the captain declines because they cannot enter Russian or Chinese airspace earlier than scheduled.

No doubt . . . the route going was further east than returning, at least over Canada.

But I'm pretty sure the 45 degree dogleg when we hit Mongolian airspace was not the most efficient path.