To get a path for a continuum robot in the environment like the aircraft fuel tank, a path planning algorithm based on regional-advance strategy was proposed. By combining with the mechanical constraints of the robot, the method could ensure that arbitrary points can be reached in the single cabin. With the flexibility of movement, but the hyper-redundant freedom degree of the continuum robot brings about both the multiple path solutions in three-dimensional space and high time complexity. The approach based on dimension reduction, which is transforming the planning in three-dimensional space into that in two-dimensional plane, was presented to reduce the computing complexity. The single cabin of the aircraft fuel tank was divided to two regions, and the planning strategy was determined by the regional location of the target point. Finally, the Matlab simulation experiments were carried out, and the practicability and effectiveness of the proposed method were verified.