It took a Falcon 8X with four passengers and 200 pounds of baggage just four hours and 28 minutes last week to fly from Santa Monica Airport, California (SMO) to Teterboro, New Jersey (TEB). The flight, with almost no tailwind, beat the previous record by a full 24 minutes.
What made this flight special is that the original record was set by another aircraft departing SMO, but long before 1,500 feet of the airport’s then 5,000-foot runway was eliminated by the city of Santa Monica. SMO now represents a specific challenge because of its 3,500-foot runway length, as well as a strict noise abatement departure procedure.
The Falcon 8X required a balanced field length of 3,200 feet when it departed at 8:08 a.m. local time and less than 2,000 feet of runway upon landing. During the takeoff from SMO, the climb-out measured significantly below the 95 dBA SEL local sound limit. The 8X landed in Teterboro at 3:36 p.m. local time. The record is pending official ratification by the National Aeronautic Association (NAA) in Washington, DC.
