as the crow flies

From the fact that while crows fly to their source of food, their flight bypasses obstacles like rivers and terrain. Compare beeline.

• "It is 15 kilometers as the crow flies."
• "ʽFire,ʼ said Bill, ʽin the form of a common cowshed, is burnin' about nor'-nor'-east as the crow flies.ʼ"
• "The distance from Sarajevo to Ploce is 75 miles as the crow flies, but because of the difficult terrain the new line is 120 miles long."
• "Then it told me the distance between the two is 331 miles, which is totally irrelevant as that's as the crow flies and not the 393 miles of the rail route."

• as the gull flies
• as the raven flies

• beeline
• displacement