Freedoms of The Air - Second Freedom

Second Freedom

The second freedom allows technical stops without the embarking or disembarking of passengers or cargo. It is the right to stop in one country solely for refueling or other maintenance on the way to another country.

The most famous example of the second freedom is Shannon Airport, which was used as a stopping point for most North Atlantic flights until the 1960s. Anchorage was similarly used for flights between Western Europe and East Asia, bypassing Soviet airspace, until the 1980s. Anchorage is still used by some mainland Chinese and Taiwanese airlines for flights to the U.S. and Toronto. Also, flights between Europe and South Africa often stopped at Ilha do Sal (Sal Island), off the coast of Senegal, due to many African nations refusing to allow South African flights to overfly their territory during the Apartheid regime. Gander, Newfoundland was also a frequent stopping point for airlines from the USSR and East Germany on the way to the Caribbean, Central America, Mexico and South America.

Because of longer range of modern airliners, second freedom rights are comparatively rarely exercised by passenger carriers today, but they are widely used by air cargo carriers, and are more or less universal between countries.