Calling California flight experts

[Loulou127]

Are there or have there even been direct flights from the U.K. to Sacramento?

[loldis]

No. As far as I know, it's never had Transatlantic service. Primarily domestic, with a handful of flights to Canada and Mexico as well.

[Bad Pink Tink]

Originally Posted by Loulou127

Are there or have there even been direct flights from the U.K. to Sacramento?

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Not as far as I know. European routes are to the big cities, LA, San Francisco, San Diego and then you will have to transfer to get a flight to Sacramento.

Ive flown out of Sacramento when I went to visit a friend. It says international because there are flights to Canada but it felt more like a regional airport.

[cornishfrogboy]

International flights seem to have only started in 2002, Canada and Mexico.

They do fly to Honolulu, though.

I guess that an 8600’ runway would prohibit true longhaul.

[Loulou127]

Thank you all, that’s what I thought, a family member has a relative who lives close to Sacramento and they’re waiting for direct flights to open up before they visit, me thinks they’re going to wait a long time!

[cornishfrogboy]

Originally Posted by Loulou127

Thank you all, that’s what I thought, a family member has a relative who lives close to Sacramento and they’re waiting for direct flights to open up before they visit, me thinks they’re going to wait a long time!

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The runway would not take a wide body laden for a 10 hr flight to the U.K. Even a 787 is listed at 8500’ at Sea Level. Temperatures would also affect things.

What Sacramento does have (wiki it) is great links to practically all the majors nearby, LAX, SFO, Seattle, Vancouver.

[Bad Pink Tink]

Originally Posted by Loulou127

Thank you all, that’s what I thought, a family member has a relative who lives close to Sacramento and they’re waiting for direct flights to open up before they visit, me thinks they’re going to wait a long time!

See more...

During Covid international flights were only allowed to enter USA through 14 airports, mainly East coast such as JFK, Boston, Chicago etc This was a requirement from the USA CDC.

The rule was relaxed in September 2020 but due to the extensive travel bans, many airlines did not restart direct flights from Europe to California.

Air Lingus have announced that direct flights to San Francisco will restart in December but there is still no restart date for the LAX route.

[loldis]

Originally Posted by cornishfrogboy

The runway would not take a wide body laden for a 10 hr flight to the U.K. Even a 787 is listed at 8500’ at Sea Level. Temperatures would also affect things.

What Sacramento does have (wiki it) is great links to practically all the majors nearby, LAX, SFO, Seattle, Vancouver.

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What about the new extended range narrow bodies like the A321LR? I don't think they have quite enough range to get from the west coast to London yet, but can't be more than a couple iterations away. The XLR is due into service in a few years and just about tops out at that distance.

Just because I'm curious, I can't see Sacramento ever getting any significant international presence. More thinking a JetBlue Mint cabin direct to LAX could be nice and they seem to prefer a narrow body fleet.

[cornishfrogboy]

Originally Posted by loldis

What about the new extended range narrow bodies like the A321LR? I don't think they have quite enough range to get from the west coast to London yet, but can't be more than a couple iterations away. The XLR is due into service in a few years and just about tops out at that distance.

Just because I'm curious, I can't see Sacramento ever getting any significant international presence. More thinking a JetBlue Mint cabin direct to LAX could be nice and they seem to prefer a narrow body fleet.

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There is no doubt that the ER narrow bodies can serve much of the East Coast, especially with their ETOPS ratings being well over 300 minutes.
Don’t think that they can do the West Coast yet.

Sacramento? I can’t think that they would get sufficient volume of passengers with San Francisco and Oakland not so far away.

Just looked up the 321NEO it has a range of around 4000 nautical miles. The distance from LHR to Sacramento is 4590nm. A Neo at 100 tons requires 9000 feet of runway, although this obviously is variable with altitude of runway and ambient temperature.

[loldis]

Yeah, not for Sacramento. No reason as you say with SFO so close.

You just caught my interest thinking about some west coast plane alternatives. The XLR is 4700nm which is just shy of the LAX flight distance. Can't be far off getting there.

If the LHR-SYD ULR direct enters commercial service beyond the test flights, I'd be on that just for fun. But that's a widebody and now I'm going really off topic.