Expert: Marc Eichler - 1/13/2010

Question
QUESTION: I need to know the nonstop flight time between L.A. and Dakar, Senegal.  I'm told a Gulfstream V can fly it nonstop with ten passengers.  If this is correct, what would be the flying time?  Thanks very much.

ANSWER: To answer this question, I punched in a theoretical flight between Los Angeles and Dakar, Senegal into Microsoft Flight Simulator X.  I used direct GPS settings, which is pretty much a straight line flight between the two points, as opposed to using different airways and navagational beacons.  The estimated flight time for this would be 11 hours, 43 minutes.  The Gulfstream V has a maximum range of 5800 nautical miles, and the distance between Los Angeles and Dakar is 5435.  In theory, a Gulfstream V could make the flight, but it would be very tight with fuel.  A pilot likely would want to make a refuelling stop just for safety's sake.

I hope this answere your question.

Thanks for using allexperts.

Regards,

Marc

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Thanks, Marc.  Does the software let you determine where would be a likely refueling stop?

Answer
Flight Simulator does not help in that terms of planning, but figuring the range of the aircraft, stopping somewhere on the East Coast of the United States would probably be best.  Keep in mind if you were to choose to stop in another country for fuel, you would likely have a lot of additional paperwork to fill out.

To find an airport with fuel, I would suggest using the website www.airnav.com or www.flightaware.com .  They will both help with flight planning, and on airnav, they also have fuel prices at many airports in the United States.  You may want to have a list of airports based on weather conditions at the time.  for example, if your flight path takes you over the northeastern US, we are prone to bad winter weather this time of year that can shut down airports.

Keep in mind that there are a lot of variables to take into account with how much fuel to plan on, the most important of these is weather.  Going from LA to Dakar, you will be flying with the jet stream, so you will have a tailwind helping to push the aircraft along.  How strong the jet stream depends on the weather at the time.  Likewise, coming back from Dakar, you will be flying against the jet stream.  For example, I went to Israel on a flight that took a little over 9 hours from New York.  Coming back to the US, the flight took closer to 11.

I hope this information is useful to you.

Regards,

Marc