Aviation analytics company Cirium is out with August data on airline on-time performance. Delta has recovered from saying CrowdStrike, CrowdStrike, CrowdStrike over and over to post an 80.9% on-time arrival performance, good enough for number one in North America. United and Southwest were a solid number two and three, both on-time over 78% of the time.
American Airlines beat out only Spirit, Frontier and JetBlue at the bottom of the pack, though American was more likely to cancel flights than Spirit and Frontier. Their poor showing in August follows Department of Transportation data about June and the first half of the year showing poor performance for the Dallas-based carrier.
Delta was bested slightly in on-time performance for August by their vassal LATAM.
Globally, Aeromexico and Saudia are riding a consistent wave of strong operational performance for several months. Thai AirAsia, the most on-time airline in Asia in August (followed very close behind by Vietnam Airlines and Singapore Airlines) had a 100% completion factor for the month. That’s not just a day without cancelling a flight which other airlines brag about – that’s every day the entire month, with the caveat that about one half of one percent of the airline’s data isn’t included in the sample.
The most on-time airports track closely to where the most on-time airlines hub. The two go hand in hand, because on-time performers make an airline look good but statistics for both are affected by severe weather. Mexico City and Riyadh were the most on-time global airports. Good weather Los Angeles didn’t let construction or congestion get in the way, topping the largest U.S. airports. (Delta hub Salt Lake City was next.)
Honolulu gets large airport honors. Weather doesn’t get more consistent than Hawaii.
Gary clearly wants to wind up the crowd.
As I have said, DL had very strong operational performance before the CRWD disaster and has returned to it – did so within a week after the IT meltdown.
While DL, CRWD and MSFT can hash out the reasons, DL’s claims about its operational performance being industry leading haven’t changed.
Given that various types of external disruptions regularly hit the airline industry – including ATC issues for NYC and esp. EWR this summer plus the MAX 9 grounding that hit AS and UA earlier in the year, real customers look at the product and service airlines deliver day in and day out.
DL will retain its position for the year as the most reliable US airline based on current trends and performance for the 1st 6 months as Gary noted. AS and HA will be in there w/ strong performance followed by UA.
It is noteworthy that AA execs say that schedule is the product but schedule is not just what is sold but what is delivered.
B6 noted its on-time performance is improving so AA’s performance relative to the industry is likely to deteriorate unless AA changes course.
I have had to cancel more than one American flight in the past month and drive because of their constant delays. And I fly out of one of their hubs.
Give Delta 3 or 4 months and they will be right back in the premium toilet they crawled out of.
And then there is pathetic Air Canada.
It really should be included in these reports.
Lots of Americans get suckered in by AC and their cheap fares, only to arrive on time half the time.
Awww, Tim.
See? not every article is a deep conspiratorial attempt to make your life miserable?
Imagine handling other articles about Delta with class and not worrying what others think?
American is right where Isom wants us, leading the ULCC pack!
I can confirm American Airlines is in a free fall.
Tim clearly works on commission.
the only people whose lives are miserable are those that think that someone talking about real data – which Gary posted – is miserable or being paid a commission.
Delta has led the industry for years in operational reliability, CrowdStrike put a dent in DL’s performance for a week, DL has bounced back to where it was, and other airlines are right where they were before CrowdStrike – or worse.
And just a reminder that UA cancelled 2.5% of their July flights compared to 4.2% for DL – so either UA had a bad July for other reasons or CRWD wasn’t just a DL problem.
And as much as some want to argue otherwise, AA is the issue here. and the reason why DL is doing so much better financially is because they run a far more reliable operation. When you consider that DL’s ATL hub is the world’s largest but AA has hubs at DFW and CLT that compete with ATL traffic flows, high value connecting passengers have lots of reason to fly DL over AA. ATL is far from perfect but it works operationally and consistently ends up as the best very large US carrier hub in on-time performance. add in the strong operational performance at DTW, MSP and SLC on top of DL’s outperformance in NYC, BOS, LAX and even SEA and it isn’t hard to see why DL carries so much more premium traffic than any other carrier.
Since the merger with US, the current AA has made it clear it doesn’t see the coach passenger as a priority. Similar to the way the ULCCs do. They just want fees from you, not a positive experience. Now on the International/Long Haul AA side AA has introduced new amenities. The issue is that the back of the plane gets to the gate at the same time as the front of the gate. A missed connection (particularly to a one flight destination/last flight of the night) is a missed connection whether you’re in 2A or 32E. The premium passenger that doesn’t get a pre departure drink is getting what the coach passenger paid for, nothing before flight.
The board of American Airlines exists to protect the C-suite.
Looks like Delta had shocked the industry again – colliding with one of your own planes is never a good thing.
While I, too, as an AA captive, have suffered from delays and cancellations this summer, it is also only fair to agree that the south east have had a particularly challenging weather event filled summer. We have had significant storms and tornado’s across the south-east of the US, and one hurricane. Does that make cancellations or delays any less irritating? Nope – but I would rather be in an overcrowded terminal than fly through really bad weather. Having experienced both a few times – give me a crowded Admirals Club anytime!
Two Delta planes had a Premium Collision in Atlanta. That ought to build confidence with the public.
Good heavens!! They have done more and more to screw their passengers, especially on the ridiculously scheduled close connections and late operations; in order to supposedly leave on time and this is the result. Just another example of how out of touch upper management is with the operation. Hopefully, a repeat of what is happening to their Love Field neighbors cannot be far behind. It has to start with a total house cleaning in the Board Room.
Obviously, Delta is the world’s only PERFECT airline.
@ Max — That would require having class.
it is beyond hypocritical for Max or Gene to talk about class.
but that is all those two know.
Yeah, some Delta captain gets to spend a little more time on the golf course.
Tom knows class, economy class.
American has given most of their SFO gates to Alaska and has two gates and two supertugs. What this means is if you are arriving in SFO in the evening you will typically wait on a taxiway for about an hour for American to clear one of their gates. Apparently this has been going on for quite a while and must be the way American wants things to run.
Tim
Mentioning to others about your own tragic background of being fired by delta, banned from other websites, the use of MULTIPLE other username (while trying to lie about your own real name and be mad at others using a pseudonym as you do now), your now-admitted use of bots on multiple websites, or calling out your flat out nonsensical lies…
You have no class because your life is a lie and you have no life. It’s actually sad but you don’t even seem self aware enough to realize NO ONE agrees with you.
And it has nothing to do with delta, a respected company that makes a lot of money and exaggerates a TON in their marketing
It’s just you being too obtuse to realize your own self worth.
But please. Reply with your usual nonsense because someone informs others about your real background. I expect nothing less
You are the epitome of online trolling
But I am glad Gary gets some clicks out of you. And it’s why I reply. Gary writes some good articles
You’re just an idiot
American Rising! Up 2 spots from July. Keep climbing!
ISOM NEEDS TO GO! He is, far and away, the worst CEO the airline ever had. Parker was better, but just slightly. It’s telling that Scott Kirby, who is bringing improvements to United’s customer experience, left AA. The entire board at AA, and entire management team, especially Kimberly Cisek, in charge of customer experience, need to go. Steve Johnson chief of strategy, apparently has everything wrong, too. AA has excelled at one thing: taking massive investments in new airplanes and building the biggest domestic network which could feed an unbeatable international network, and throwing all those massive investments in the toilet by going on the cheap, penny-wise and pound-foolish, on seat comfort and customer space, lack of seatback entertainment, catering, etc. And how could AA take the newest fleet yet have the most delays and cancellations, by far?!? How could AA take the highest pay and costs, yet have the worst employee morale and worst customer experience? Sounds impossible, but somehow AA has managed a complete epic fail. What makes it especially unbelievable is that they still don’t seem to realize it.
It’s pretty well known that part of Delta’s on-time performance is due to its padding of flight lengths. I am curious to what extent other airlines are doing the same. Can anyone speak to this?
While waiting to board a flight recently, I met a DL very frequent flyer who had an interesting perspective on Delta’s flight time padding. He said he lives in a community with a smaller airport so has to make a lot of connections. He pointed out that the DL time padding is a competitive advantage in that he rarely misses connections. He says it’s a major reason he is loyal to Delta. I must admit that I had never thought about it in that way.
It’s easy to be #1 when you block your flights 10-20% longer than the competition. Example my friend flew VS from LHR to JFK last week, the flight was blocked at 7h40, the same DL flight leaving at almost the same time was blocked at 8h25, 45 minutes longer and even as long as JBU on a tiny 321LR. I flew DL to DFW and their flights were on average blocked 20-30m longer than AA from LGA & JFK. Hardly a surprise to be “early” when the flight actually took 3 and a half hours and not the 4h20m blocked. Also easy to be ahead of the likes of B6 who have nearly their entire operation touch NYC, BOS, MCO & FLL which are all disproportionately affected by weather ATC constraints unlike SLC, MSP & ATL which rarely have GDPs.
American Rising
I know a few American employees. They wonder why Elliott has decided to pick a fight with Southwest, and not American.
Yes, the Southwest business model may be outdated for the post-Covid world that seems to be skewing towards premium travel.
But, American was truly a world-class carrier under Bob Crandall. And for all of the issues that labor had with Don Carty, he also kept American among the best in various performance measures.
My friends are all union members and feel that Doug Parker misled the unions, when US Airways was attempting to buy AA out of bankruptcy. Issom is cut from the same cloth as Parker.
They would like to see some activist shareholder come in and gain board seats, fire Issom and his leadership team, and bring in a team that understands that running an airline means spending money on seatback entertainment, customer service training, operations that run on time, and premium cabins that are premium in the hard product and soft product.
I think Elliot trying to make money off of a stake in Southwest makes much more sense than trying to do it off a stake in American even though the capitalization of Southwest is more than twice that of American. Maybe the difference is how happy the employees seem. That may go a long way in making changes at an airline. If employees are unhappy, their position will be defensive and they will be resistant to change, IMO.