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Flights between South America and East Asia are very time consuming and expensive; they generally require a connection in Europe or North America, numerous connections, and long layovers.

Every year or so I have done a search for direct flights between South America and East Asia, or between South America and Southeast Asia. There always seems to be rumors of a direct flight, or some airline has a plan, but never multiple airlines competing on this route, nor are there extensive plans.

SE Travel is fairly quiet on this issue; just this question about Mexico comes close, but travel between Mexico to South America is a fairly long haul.

I always hope to see a flight from Manila or Tokyo to Lima, but it never seems to materialize. The question: Any news about a direct flight between SE Asia & East Asia and South America?

Edit: I want to note that Mexico is part of North America; I am specifically asking for direct flights to/from the South American continent.

Community
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Astor Florida
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4 Answers4

35

I'm afraid you can stop hoping, because with current airplane technology, direct flights between East or Southeast Asia and South America are effectively impossible.

The maximum practical range of today's best planes hovers around 8,000 nautical miles. The longest flight ever flown commercially anywhere was Singapore Airlines' Singapore-Newark service at exactly 9,000 nm (on the return leg), but this was possible only with favorable winds and using a modified business-only configuration, and the flight between two economic powerhouses still was terminated as unprofitable.

Unfortunately for you, all economically feasible routes between Asia and South America are longer than 9000nm. Tokyo to Lima clocks in at 9600nm, while Singapore or Bangkok to Lima would be an even more infeasible 12000nm. Flights to larger and thus more attractive cities in Brazil, Chile or Argentina would be even longer!

lambshaanxy
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Is going via Australia or New Zealand not an option? Qantas 27 runs direct from Sydney to Santiago, Chile every other day, while LAN Chile 800 runs the same route daily with an intermediate stop in Auckland, NZ. There's also Air New Zealand 30 that flies from Auckland to Buenos Aires, Argentina, but it's Fri-Sun-Tues only.

UnrecognizedFallingObject
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4

The only flight I know of along that route is on AeroMexico; Narita - Mexico City (AMX57), Mexico City - Lima (AMX48).

That is a nearly 12 hour flight on the 787-800.

Other than that, all other options are through either Canada / US; or the other way around from Europe / Middle East.

For direct flights to South America; I only know of Emirates 261 and Qatar Airways 0773 - both are to Sau Paulo.

If you want to get to Lima, it is quicker to go from Sao Paulo to Lima (flight time 5 hours 15 minutes) vs. Mexico City to Lima (5 hours 50 minutes); however it is longer to get from Tokyo to Sau Paulo.

Your best option is the AeroMexico flight. It will save you approx 10 hours.

Burhan Khalid
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Thanks to the Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner aircraft's aviation range, Japan's airlines All Nippon Airways [ANA] flies the NRT-MEX route same as Aeromexico's AMX57, since 15th February 2017.

ANA's article about the launch can be accessed here -> https://www.ana.co.jp/group/en/pr/201611/20161110.html.

a better read is here -> https://airwaysmag.com/airlines/ana-mexico-city-first-asian-carrier-fly-nonstop-latin-america/

computingfreak
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