Overnight flying USA to Central America

[ozflier1]

Hi,
I have flown from the USA to central america twice in the last 12 months ( Lima and Quito) both overnight flights .
It is inconvenient and I hate redeyes and must waste aircraft while they sit on the ground in the middle of the day.
I have heard that this happens because turbulence during daylight from the isthmus and the mountains can be dangerous.
Is this true ?

[PAXboy]

Welcome aboard ozflier1.

I have not ridden that route but another North/South route that I know intimately (London~Johannesburg + Capt Town) they run overnight and are parked up during the day.
The reason is that business folk do not like long daylight flights as it wastes time. So the price is higher because the aircraft wait on the ground in South Africa. When the machine gets back to London, Frankfurt or elsewhere in Europe, it is able to go on to other routes. But when it is down route due South, it just sits for the best part of 12 hours. This may be one of the reasons that the Lima and Quito flights do this. It depends on the level of Biz traffic. For South Africa, it's a high number.

When these flights traverse central Africa, there are usually thunderstorms around, it is often bumpy and sometimes they need to zig-zag around to avoid them and that is in the middle of the night.

[DaveReidUK]

I have not ridden that route but another North/South route that I know intimately (London~Johannesburg + Capt Town) they run overnight and are parked up during the day.BA have two evening flights from LHR to JNB and, as described above, the aircraft in question won't arrive back at LHR until nearly 36 hours later, having spent 12 hours on the ground at JNB in the meantime.

That's why you will rarely, if ever, see the same aircraft doing two consecutive South Africa rotations - the outbound aircraft will typically have arrived at LHR in the afternoon from, say, the USA or Canada and the inbound aircraft will be turned around for a mid-morning departure on another route.