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The world's shortest international flight is coming to an end
By Jess McHugh, Jess McHugh
Published April 05, 2017
The world's shortest international flight won't be around for much longer. (People's Air Group/Travel and Leisure)
At just eight minutes long, a commuter flight between Switzerland and Germany became the shortest international flight in the world after its maiden voyage in November 2016.
Just five months later, the flight will no longer exist, local news outlets reported.
The flight had been too costly and did not attract the number of passengers expected, according to leadership from the Austrian People's Air Group, the carrier that ran the flight.
"There was indeed small, recognizable progress, but we don't think that the targeted number of passengers could have been reached," airline owner Markus Kopf told The Local.
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The trip from St. Gallen-Altenrhein, Switzerland, to Friedrichshafen, Germany, had beaten the previous record of an international flight that flew from Vienna, Austria, to Bratislava, Slovakia, in 10 minutes.
"This stopover will benefit both tourists and commuters working on both sides of the lake and, of course, it is also likely to become a must in every aviation enthusiast's logbook," Danel Steffen, CEO of Austrian People's Air Group, told CNN at the time of its launch.
Despite the short duration of the Swiss-German flight, its launch in 2016 was not without controversy. Environmentalists argued that the amount fuel required for the short flight was disproportionate to its usefulness.
The final takeoff is scheduled for April 14.
https://www.foxnews.com/travel/the-worlds-shortest-international-flight-is-coming-to-an-end