Just 40 Minutes: Introducing The World's New Very Short Widebody Flight

Starting this winter, Air Caraïbes—an airline that gets little attention internationally—will begin a brand-new very short widebody service. It will operate triangularly: Paris Orly-Samana-Santo Domingo-Paris Orly. The Samana-Santo Domingo leg is entirely within the Dominican Republic, with no traffic rights available. It may appear in my Weekly Routes article (see the most recent edition here).

The 389-seat Airbus A350-900 will be used, with ch-aviation showing that the carrier has four of them. Samana-Santo Domingo has a 40-minute block time. It will cover just 50 nautical miles (93 km) each way. Despite these things, it will not be the world’s shortest twin-aisle operation by either time or distance.

A Quick Look At Air Caraïbes’s Coming Service

According to OAG data, Air Caraïbes has served Paris Orly to Santo Domingo for 13 years. However, it has never flown to Samana, which will change in just over two months. The carrier revolves around both outbound tourism from Paris and visiting friends and relatives traffic to Francophone destinations in the Caribbean.

It will provide the only link from Europe to Samana, which is located on the north coast of the Dominican Republic. Its first flight will depart from the French capital on December 15, with frequencies growing from weekly to two weekly in early 2026. The stop en route to Santo Domingo means a much lower-cost and lower-risk way of serving Samana.

In the past two decades, Samana has welcomed flights from multiple airports, including Copenhagen, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Helsinki, Lisbon, London Gatwick, Madrid, Milan Malpensa, Moscow Sheremetyevo, Paris CDG, Paris Orly (until 2008), Stockholm Arlanda, etc.

The World’s Widebody Flights Of No More Than 40 Minutes

Simple Flying

Let’s narrow the time focus to December 2025 to February 2026. During this period, the world’s shortest scheduled widebody services—whether bookable or not—are as follows. This is ordered by the minimum block time (chocks-off-to-chocks-on). Two links have just a 30-minute block, of which only one—Zanzibar to Dar es Salaam—is bookable in its own right (more on that later). All are quicker than the US and Canada’s shortest twin-aisle services.

As you might expect, the results would be somewhat different by distance. Then, the world-famous shortest flight by great circle distance, which is Air France between Brazzaville and Kinshasa (or vice versa), would be first. But with a block of 40 minutes, it is not number one for block time.

A Look At Air Tanzania’s Very Short 787-8 Service

Air Tanzania is a small East African airline. Like most state-owned carriers, its fleet is small yet highly complex, with multiple consequences. It has 16 aircraft: one 767-300F, one Dash 8-300, two 737-900s, three 787-8s, four A220-300s, and five Dash 8-400s. Each of its 787s has 262 seats: 240 in economy and 22 in business. Depending on the number of passenger bags, they can carry up to 20 tons of freight—important for its China services.

The carrier serves Dar-Guangzhou-Zanzibar-Dar three weekly, primarily for traders, Chinese workers, and Chinese migrants. Booking data for July 2024 to June 2025 shows that Africa had 800,000+ round-trip passengers from/to Guangzhou. Most people flew with Ethiopian, followed by EgyptAir, Qatar Airways, Emirates, and Air Tanzania.

Dar was the third-largest market, after Cairo and Algiers. Having arrived in Zanzibar early on Wednesdays, Fridays, and Sundays, Air Tanzania flight TC403 leaves at 07:30 and returns to Dar at 08:00. It is the world’s shortest bookable widebody flight by time. According to Flightradar24, the 787-operated service can take as little as 12 minutes.

Stock Code

BA

Business Type

Planemaker

Date Founded

July 15, 1916

CEO

Kelly Ortberg