Only 69% of flights left on time in December. Are airlines back to working order?
Did you know that 69% of flights left on time in December 2022?
The U.S. Department of Transportation reported that of the domestic flights within the U.S. only 69.1% of the flights left on time.
The report showed that the December rate was lower than the November 2022 percentage of 80% flights that left on time.
Was this due to airport failures or airline failures?
Here’s what we know.
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Why were flights late in December? Simple Flying reported that the delays in December were due to each airline’s individual operations.
The delays came from different issues such as canceled flights, lost bags and more.
Axios reported that 57.3% of Southwest’s flights took off on time, which was lower percentages than Delta Air Lines with 77.2%, United Airlines with 70.7% and American Airlines with 72.5%.
At the end of December, Southwest had canceled more than 70% of its flights in a week, according to the Deseret News.
“USDOT” is concerned by Southwest Airlines’ disproportionate and unacceptable rate of cancellations and delays as well as the failure to properly support customers experiencing a cancellation or delay,” the department said at the time of the incident.
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What else was found in the report? In the December 2022 DOT report, it was detailed that a total of 547,134 U.S. flights operated, which was a lower amount of flights compared to the 566,465 flights that operated in December 2021.
Seventy-nine tarmac delays of more than three hours were also reported for the month compared to the eight tarmac delays in November 2022.
The report also found a 1.09% mishandled bag rate which is higher than the pre-pandemic December 2019 rate of 0.66% of mishandled bags.
Axios further reported that some of the country’s worst airports for on-time performance rates in the month were the Denver International Airport, Austin-Bergstrom International Airport and the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.
