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The newly restarted flight from Atlanta to Johannesburg is the ninth longest air route in the world, measuring in at 8,434 miles, according to the British travel data provider OAG.
The 17-hour jaunt from the Georgia capital to the South African commercial center, operated by Delta Air Lines Inc., has for years placed in the top 10 but has traveled toward the bottom of the pack as more marathon routes have come on line.
It comes in just 101 miles ahead of the 10th-longest flight — a sojourn from Dubai to Los Angeles, presumably operated by Emirates Airline.
Singapore Airlines has both of the top two longest hauls, one operating from the Southeast Asian nation to New York-JFK and another to Newark. Singapore flights to Los Angeles and San Francisco also sit at No. 5 and No. 7, respectively. Third is a flight from London-Heathrow to the Western Australia city of Perth.
While pushed down to No. 9, the ATL-Joburg flight comes in at No. 4 when measured by the number of available seats on a top-10 route in September 2022: 15,912.
Delta recently announced it would also begin flights from Atlanta to Cape Town in December.
