How long is flight to Somalia?

Answer 1

Flight times differ greatly depending on where you start and what type of aircraft you use.

If you start in Somalia or close to the Somalian border in for example Ethiopia, flight time would be very short or neglible.

At the other edge of the spectrum is the worst-case scenario where you would be starting at the opposite side of the Earth. Soamlia is roughly 1000 km along its greatest axis and the Earth has a mean radius of 6,371.0 km. For this enterprise you should consider the use of a large airliner such as the Airbus A380 series or the very-long-range Boeing 777-200ER or LR editions. These aircraft typically cruise at roughly 10 km altitude. From this we can deduce that wherever you take off, you are never further away from Somalian mainland than

(2 * pi * (earth mean radius + 10 km) - 1000 km)/2 = 19546.5 km

These airliners effectively cruise at roughly Mach 0.85, that is 85% of speed of sound which is in turn a function of local temprature and density. According to standard atmospheric models temprature is roughly -53oC and pressure 230 hPa at 10 000 m above sea level. This boils down to a local speed of sound of 260 m/s, giving you a velocity of 260 * 0.85 = 221 m/s or about 800 km/h relative to the wind. Thus, neglecting additional takeoff and landing time and weather conditions, the total flight time would be in the magnitude of 24 hours 30 minutes.

Both of the proposed aircrafts have a range in the vicinity of 15 000 km at full passanger capacity. If you travel alone, modifying the aircraft to carry additional fuel is plausible, but with standard production models you are probably forced to make at least one refueling stop. Depending on conditions this will probably make for roughly 2 hours extra travel time.

An option to cut flight times is to travel by some military high-performance fighter aircraft or ideally a SR-71 Blackbird. This would almost double the attainable cruising speed but will require more refuelling stops or very complex use of in-air refuelling facilities (in which case the list of usable aircraft is considerably smaller). As high-speed aircraft are usually one-man vehicles you will need the ability to fly the aircraft yourself. Pilot fatigue can potentially become an issue.

Word of advice: if applicable, you should choose an eastbound route close to the equator to exploit the jet streams and greatly reduce flight time as well as improve efficiency.