On January 1, 2025, passengers aboard Cathay Pacific Flight 880 got a strange surprise: after taking off just after midnight from Hong Kong, the plane landed in Los Angeles at 10 p.m.—on December 31, 2024. In other words, they arrived the day *before* they left. The strange timing wasn’t a glitch, but the result of flying eastward across the International Date Line.
The Mechanics Behind It
The International Date Line, which zigzags mostly along the 180th meridian, serves as the line where calendar days flip. If you fly east over it, you subtract a day. Head west, you add one. That’s why some eastbound flights land *before* they took off—like something straight out of a sci-fi movie. Time and Date explains how the phenomenon works for commercial flights.
Celebrating the New Year—Twice
For those looking to maximize their party plans, certain flights allow you to ring in the new year two times in two cities. One example: United Airlines Flight 133, which leaves Majuro in the Marshall Islands just after midnight and lands in Honolulu late on December 31—letting passengers rewind the clock and toast all over again. Travel experts often highlight this annual time-bending opportunity.
Short Flights, Big Time Gains
You don’t need to fly halfway around the world to experience this, either. Talofa Airways runs a route between Pago Pago and Apia—just 93 miles apart but on opposite sides of the date line. According to One Mile at a Time, passengers can leave in the morning and arrive… yesterday.
The Concorde Pulled It Off Too
It wasn’t just about crossing time zones. The Concorde, with its ability to cruise faster than Mach 2, could beat the rotation of the Earth itself. Flights from London to New York would often land earlier than their departure time. One aviation forum thread on Airliners.net breaks down the math—and just how surreal it felt to arrive before you left.
A Fascinating Quirk of the Clock
While no one’s literally jumping through wormholes, flights like these are a fun reminder that time is as much a man-made concept as it is a scientific one. Flying across zones and calendars gives passengers stories that feel straight out of fiction—and make for a heck of a trivia fact.
It’s one of those oddities of global travel that you have to experience to believe. There’s no DeLorean or time machine involved—just clever scheduling, some Earth geometry, and a boarding pass that says you arrived yesterday.
