News and notes from around the interweb:
- Data shows long airline delays are becoming more frequent
A 3‑hour delay in 2024 is four times more likely compared to 1990 even as scheduled flight times have gotten longer. There are a lot more flights, but airport capacity and air traffic control capacity hasn’t grown. So there’s no longer slack in the system.
Starting around 2008, Scheduled flight times began increasing even faster than actual ones, and are now 20 minutes longer than their 1987 pairs along the same routes. This divergence makes it look like far more flights are early in 2024 when in reality almost all flights are taking longer.
…It’s 4.5 times more likely to have your flight delayed by more than 3 hours today than it was in 1990. 1-1.5hr delays are both around twice as common as well.
Local governments haven’t been good about growing airports and staffing and the tech stack for ATC has lagged world standard, as FAA regulates itself (poor accountability).
- The Math Trick Hidden in Your Credit Card Number The Luhn algorithm, understanding your card’s digits.
- The Tokyo Haneda Amex lounge looks far nicer than any in the U.S. And it’s just just ‘an Asia thing’ because it looks far nicer than the Hong Kong Centurion lounge as well.
- We rate this claim as true:
At Dulles, Iberia flight crew over intercom explaining delay to Madrid-DC passengers waiting to deplane:
“They have a very abnormal system to take passengers to the terminal.”
— Overheard District (@OverheardWDC) August 11, 2025
- Qantas now offers atrocious value points upgrades on American Airlines
- Alaska Airlines continues to pull down long haul flying from Honolulu as it finds better uses for widebody aircraft out of Seattle.
Hawaiian Airlines announces it will discontinue 3 long-haul routes:
• Honolulu (HNL) to Boston (BOS) from November 19
• Honolulu (HNL) to Fukuoka (FUK) from November 19
• Honolulu (HNL) to Seoul (ICN) from November 21— Ishrion Aviation (@IshrionA) August 13, 2025
“compared to 1990” niccce.
@1990 — You got a shoutout! Niiiice indeed.
The credit card thing is neat. I heard about it before but had long forgotten. Very creative.
Re: IAD – “Abnormal”? More like unique, heh.
Yeah, if only we passengers were compensated by airlines for significant delays under their control, like EU/UK 261 and Canada’s APPR. Could be getting several hundred dollars back each time. Great incentive for airlines to be more reliable, too…
Interesting article on the delays, thanks Gary ! It’s apropos, as I just returned last night from an American Airlines trip where the outbound was 5 hours late, and the return was 3-3/4 hours late (both direct flights, AUS-ORD). The late outbound cost me $ 400 in additional rental car costs, and a missed meeting that was set up 3 months in advance. The late return cost me a ride from the airport, and plans that night. Even worse, I’ll reach the 3 million mile level with American next month, and I’ll get nothing for the effort (other than keeping the lifetime Platinum that I already have). The same milestone on Delta would have been lifetime Diamond Medallion (two levels higher than American). As Tim Dunn would say, I should have been flying on Delta all along.
@TexasTJ — Ahh, that’s not great. Sorry, man. Maybe Tim is onto something. Just curious, would a few hundred bucks from American for the inconveniences have made you feel a little better?
Thanks @1990, if AA had covered the actual cost of the rental delay it would have helped a good deal. That said, the missed meeting on the outbound was really unfortunate. As for the return flight, I’m able to reschedule dinner and drinks with my friend in Austin, so just the Uber fare would have made me whole. It’s really unbelievable how far American has fallen, I’ve got no idea why they have become so bad.
@TexasTJ — My average has been a trip every two weeks or so. Between summer thunderstorms, FAA shortages, everything at Newark, and last year’s Crowdstrike, I’ve also had my share of significant delays and cancellations. I’ve tried to mitigate risks with travel insurance (sometimes they pay out; other times, they find their ‘exceptions’…) When it gets real bad (or you ‘need’ to be somewhere), I’ve booked a lot of last-minute back-ups; using points, it’s nice to be able to cancel, if needed, get ’em back. Sadly, it feels like status is meaningless when bad things happen… like, we’re kinda ‘on our own.’ And, AUS-ORD is a super-long drive. Got diverted earlier this year, drove CVG to NYC. Not fun.
US airports allow airlines to file unflyable flights (literally more flights per hour than the maximum landing capacity of the airport), and airlines respond to this lack of regulation by flying ridiculously small planes everywhere. That’s the real problem.
Instead of a gazillion flights a day between Chicago and New York clogging the runways and arriving late, how about an A380 every hour?
@Mary — Sounds good to me. Even just up-gauging to most wide body aircraft, like a339/787/a350, helps for particular routes. There’s only so many slots and airspace, after all. It’s what E. Asia had to do. And if we really needed to increase capacity, we’d actually invest in high-speed rail, but that’s doubtful, at least with this current administration. Think 7 hours, NYC-Chicago, never leave the ground. Japan, China, Europeans have done it.
AA burned me today. I purposely booked GSO-DCA-ORD with a two-hour layover to compensate for delays and to try out the Admirals’ Club in Terminal E at DCA (everyone including Gary says it’s great). Then came the first half-hour delay on the GSO-DCA leg. No issue. Then the delays started rolling. Eventually they reached a point where I wouldn’t take off until after my scheduled arrival time at ORD on the connecting flight that I’d have missed. Then it finally got cancelled. So an extra night in Greensboro and a direct flight tomorrow morning. Fortunately, I had hotel points to burn and lots of free rental car days, so it’s not costing me a significant amount.
You all have the worst luck. I’ve flown many times in the last 8 months and I can’t even remember one flight being delayed. AA and SW mostly.
@Tex, you could have turned the car in, not incurred the extra charges if it was that burdensome on your budget and gone to the Admirals club to chill. Choices have consequences.
To compete and get people to buy their tickets, airlines now schedule impossibly tight flights. It seems good until actual execution. In 1990 there were many things different. Luggage was generally free. Seat assignment was generally free. Now checked luggage is an extra fee so more luggage tries to go in the cabin which causes it to be gate checked. Not good for a tighter schedule. Note that I am using tighter schedule to indicate less time at the gate for airplanes. The problem continues with seat assignments. Now there are many, many groups that all have there own specific boarding time. That slows down boarding. Also the number of gate agents have been reduced. All of these things can cause delays that can cascade. Add these things to the other problems with air travel and the longer flight delays make sense.
A380s are no longer in production. A350s and B777s are current production aircraft that can carry the most passengers with the proper configuration. With how USA airlines have shrunk seats on widebody airplanes, I wouldn’t fly them except as a last resort. So that is part of why coach passengers seem to prefer narrowbody airplanes.
@jns — *cough* a339 *cough* often, 2-4-2 in Economy, great for couples…