Delta Air Lines has cancelled hundreds of flights over the past two days. A number of readers have asked me what on earth is going on, and I’ve been a bit perplexed.
- Delta has cancelled nearly as many flights as Spirit Airlines today, and Spirit Airlines ceased operations entirely. They’ve also delayed 1,000 flights over the past two days.
- Weather is basically good, and they do not appear to be having technology issues.
- Everything I’ve heard is crew – pilots – but the stories about pilots calling out sick en masse do not check out, and it’s not clear what would have triggered that in any case. (No clear motive, always ask ‘why now?’)
The airline is no longer nearly as reliable as it used to be. And they do a poor job recovering from operational meltdowns now. Their pilot contract gets a lot of the blame and executives talked about working with the pilot union to fix this during their first quarter earnings call.
But this is only a problem when the operation itself becomes a problem. Nothing here appears to have triggered that in the first place! Aviation watchdog JonNYC is on the case.
today so far, Delta at 6% cancellation rate, AA and UA effectively 0%.
— JonNYC (@xJonNYC) May 2, 2026
not overly relevant, but,DOT numbers are out for January.
DL canceled 4.5% of flights, ranking number 6 of the large US carriers.
(yes, January had extreme weather etc) pic.twitter.com/LuDRltXPQt
— JonNYC (@xJonNYC) May 2, 2026
Delta is cancelling flights while American and United and Southwest are not cancelling flights. Delta is at 209 cancels for the day so far (Spirit shows 277). Southwest is at 21 (0%), United 15 (0%), American 4 (0%). Here’s what JonNYC has been able to confirm:
- This is a Delta-specific issue
- They are not handling it well (he notes there’s been a lot of turnover in scheduling at Delta).
- As I expected, there’s no sick out
- So it seems like the trigger could have been a delayed snowball effect from weather at the beginning of this past week. My guess here is that when scheduling fills trips, they break future pilot sequences, and then they have to go start filling those.
As far as the current situation
This definitely all seems to be directly related to DL's systems and staffing (including the fact that there are a far amount of new/inexperienced folks working in [the relevant department(s) that deal with IRROPS recovery.)
The one small caveat…
— JonNYC (@xJonNYC) May 2, 2026
The entire airline industry is in flux in an interesting way. Delta clearly isn’t as premium as it used to be, they’re even cutting drink service on short flgihts. And isn’t as reliable. They used to be operationally head and shoulders above others, but now there’s room for competition. And Delta’s President, who really ran the airline, has retired. They lost their operations guru during the pandemic (he’s now CEO of Hertz, and Hertz has stopped arresting customers!).
No airline has improved as much as United over the past decade, but they certainly aren’t meaningfully ahead of others – except for their mobile app and with Starlink wifi installs. It seems, then, there’s a real opening at the top right as there’s a real shakeup in the industry.
Gary,
It’s a trip coverage issue. ARCOS batch sizes are contractually very small. So can only call a very very small number of pilots for each trip which takes hours. So they then rely on PWA 23.M.7, which is VERY expensive.
Just more evidence that the quality differences between the three major airlines are small. DL will get their act together again. And UA and AA will screw up. It is very difficult to maintain a lead among companies that are essentially cloned.
Try getting on their 30 year old “premium” 757. Last flight the person next to me Trey table literally came off and we both wore his drink. FA gave a napkin. (Didn’t even offer another drink ). Premium
Can’t wait to see that ole Timmy Dunce has to say about this premium meltdown
in news that matters, history was made at the Kentucky Derby.
Well, I said I would never rent from Hertz again until Gary said it was safe to do so. Apparently that is now the case. I know it’s not the topic of the post, but worth noting (at least to me).
More DL failures, typical.
Spectrum boy, the news matters to all of those flying Georgia Klan Air that are now delayed.
Thanks Mr Dunn for dragging me out of sadness and reminding of joy
For some reason, I seriously.doubt if any readers contacted “you” about their experiences with Delta. I .assuming you saw Lucky’s post at Omaat amd decoded to basically “copy” it and make a post about what he saw. Please post some examples of what readers contacted you about regarding Delta… just saying that if I had a problem with a delta flight that I would probably contact delta, instead of contacting Gary!
Can’t wait to hear Ed’s smarmy excuse for the latest round of delays and cancellations that are always beyond his control. What a twonk.
It has been discovered that Delta was actually spirit all along
They were able to fool many gullible folks they were premium just by overcharging
There’s a crisis. That means it’s time for Bastian to go on vacation.
@Nicolas Reyes – first of all you are not actually Nick.
second, i saw JonNYC’s tweets before I saw Ben’s post.
third, since you’re calling me a liar here’s one example.
Apologize, maybe?
@ Tim — Are you THAT unaware of yourself? If this was some other airline, you’d be jumping for joy.
I’m pretty sure those who were scheduled to fly in/out of Louisville this weekend and whose flights were cancelled by Delta’s failure to run an “on-time machine” don’t see it as you do.
Next, you’ll post that no flights to/from Louisville have been cancelled. That would again be self-unaware.
Delta is a premium carrier as is Southwest is a low cost airline.
Fly-through from the April to the May contractual months. Clearly a crew assignment system software error which they have been unable to remedy with daily crew scheduling tools.
Well at least the SkyMiles program is very valuable and one of the best redemptions in the industry…. Oh wait….
As @chopsticks has pointed out the differences between the US3 and even the US4 (with Southwest not having a true premium product) is small. They call can be totally lousy at a time and all want to take the human out of customer service because humans cost more money than a bot.
This isn’t airline specific. It’s the tech world’s new obsession. When COVID came in we were all going to live in this virtual world and it would be just like giving grandma a hug in person. That faded out. Now it’s AI. And much of it is slop. I know, I deal with this crap daily.
I suspect a lot of crew scheduling is now AI.
@ Rene — I am getting great redemptions on Delta. Patience has proven to be a virtue. As they expand to more longhaul destinations with the acquisition of new aircraft, I expect the opportunities for excellent 2-4 cpm redemptions will continue.
@Gene — Let them eat Biscoff?
In news that matters, Tim was left speechless, unwilling to defend or dissemble for his beloved Delta.
2/4 of my Delta flights in the past 2 weeks were delayed by more than 3 hours. No issues with weather etc. In one instance, they had to swap out a plane. No apologies, compensation etc.
@PM1 — And, if we had actual air passenger rights legislation in the US, you’d’ve earned $250-600+ each time. Staffing, maintenance issues are under the airlines control. In EU/UK/Canada, you’d be owed compensation in addition to refunds or rebookings, if you wanted. Instead, we’re so beholden to corporate propaganda that folks prefer to leave that money on the table… giving Ed that $100m.
@Gary – I thought I left a comment last night retorting to “Nicholas Reyes” but don’t see it here. Did I not hit send or was there something inappropriate?