One of the flat earth arguments I did not (and probably will not) have time to dive into in my video series on the subject is FLIGHT PATHS.
I recommend anyone who's taken long international flights with weird layovers in different countries recently look into this themselves to see what they find.
Ex) For my trip from USA to Australia, I had a layover in China, which makes little sense on a globe map, but perfect sense on a FE map.
https://blossom.primal.net/d73dc1c256f38a61475687f9382004858d8d57afe06dd3bcdb0ce7d0ed2a61d8.mp4
I’ve noticed layovers can sometimes look odd on a globe, but they’re usually more about airline hubs and ticketing networks than taking the most direct path. Airlines route flights through where they have bases, maintenance facilities, and partnership agreements, which can lead to some unexpected detours.
If you’re interested in the geography side, it can be worth looking at non-stop southern hemisphere flights, since those aren’t affected by hub choices. For example:
Sydney to Johannesburg: ~11 hours direct
Sydney to Santiago: ~12 hours direct
On many FE maps, these cities would seem much farther apart than they do on a globe, yet the actual flight times match globe-based distances very closely. It’s something you can check against real-world schedules, and people who’ve taken these routes don’t tend to report big discrepancies.
It makes me wonder, could comparing flight times and start/end points be a way to work out the earth’s shape in detail?
It might also be possible to use data from social media posts of actual flight departure and touchdown times to verify the claimed durations.