When United Airlines (UAL) first envisioned a flight between Newark Liberty and the Greenland capital of Nuuk, the Chicago-based carrier had no way to foresee just how much diplomatic relations between the U.S. and Denmark would deteriorate in a year.
On Aug. 27, Denmark’s Foreign Ministry summoned the country’s top U.S. diplomat Mark Stroh after the main national news broadcaster unveiled that three Americans with connections to President Donald Trump had been discovered reaching out to residents in Greenland.
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In the early months of his second term in the White House, President Trump has made repeated comments about the Danish territory’s mining potential and how Greenlanders would “benefit” from U.S. annexation.
A March visit by Vice President JD Vance, condemned by Danish authorities, flopped in its efforts to showcase Greenlanders as wanting to join the U.S. Since then, discussions around annexation largely subsided until news of the covert efforts to drum up influence among locals broke in Denmark.
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United Airlines promises a return to “gem of the Arctic” in 2026
Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen called “any attempt to interfere in the internal affairs” of Denmark “unacceptable.”
The Trump administration shot down these claims by saying it has no control over “the actions of private U.S. citizens in Greenland,” also reiterating the past talking point of Greenlanders having the right to “determine their own future.”
It is in this diplomatic atmosphere that United Airlines is bringing back its flight to Nuuk International Airport (GOH) from Newark in 2026.
The first flight between the two cities took off in June 2025 on a Boeing 737 MAX 8 (BA) and was part of United’s widescale efforts to expand to underserved destinations such as Bilbao in Spain and Ulaanbaatar in Mongolia.
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As the weather in Greenland gets too extreme in the winter months for any widescale tourism, the flight was designed to run seasonally until September 2025, as traffic numbers from the four months were used to gauge whether the route should be returned the following year.
“Earlier this summer, I traveled to United’s ❄️coolest❄️ new destination,” United’s Senior Vice President of Global Network Planning and Alliances Patrick Quayle wrote in an Instagram post. “[…] And if you haven’t had a chance to travel to Nuuk this year, I’ve got good news: United will be returning to this gem of the Arctic in 2026.”
United Airlines has made a major push to take on competitors with underserved international destinations.
Image source: Shutterstock
This is when you will be able to take United Airlines’ flight to Greenland again
While United Airlines has not provided detail on when the Newark-Nuuk flight will again open for booking, the specifics of the territory’s Arctic temperatures mean that it will likely start running sometime in the late spring until early October at the latest.
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Over the last half-decade, tourism interest in Greenland has continued to grow. Although only a few airlines offer flights to the remote territory in the North Atlantic Ocean, Air Greenland and Air Iceland are the two main carriers connecting Greenland to the European continent.
In 2024, Air Greenland also started running a new seasonal flight between Nuuk and the Canadian province of Nunavut.
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Make a free appointment with TheStreet’s Travel Agent Partner, Postcard Travel, or email Amy Post at [email protected] or call or text her at 386-383-2472.