For today’s post, I’m going to deviate away from the latest news, but rather focus on a growing problem at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson Airport. While flipping through the most recent released statistics on airlines (March 2009), provided by the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS), I looked closely at the data available for: taxi out & other tarmac times, airline on-time performance, and data on the most delayed flights. And, after examining the data, I have found that there is a common denominator airport for high delays and weak on-time performance – Atlanta.
The Airlines
If you have been to Atlanta, or know a little bit about the airport, you know that one carrier dominates the airport; Delta Air Lines. Additionally, AirTran Airways calls Atlanta their primary hub as well. Let’s compare the two carriers’ on-time performance for march – AirTran Airways ranked 15th among American carriers with 74.01 percentage of flights arriving ontime – Delta fell one spot behind AirTran in the 16th spot with 73.88 percentage of flights arriving on-time.
The least on-time carrier for the month of March was Atlantic Southeast Airlines with just 60.90 percent of flights arriving on-time. ASA flies flights for Delta Connection – with their hubs in Cincinnati-Northern Kentucky Airport and… Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.
Overall, all three carriers were among some of the worst performers for on-time flights – making me feel as though it is not an airline issue, but rather an airport issue.
The Flights
Delayed arriving flights that occurred 70 percent or more during Q1 were tracked and recorded by the BTS. Ten out of the thirty-one flights listed either were scheduled to depart or arrive from / into Atlanta’s Harstfield airport. In fact, the highest percent not on-time flight was Comair flight 6469, which flies from Atlanta to Mobile. The flight was not on-time 90.63 percent of the time.
For taxi-out time (data from March 2009), all flights with a taxi-out time of 5 hours or more were departing Atlanta. A good chunk of the 4 hours + were from Atlanta as well. You can view the charts here.
Conclusion
As the world’s busiest airport, it should not be too surprising that the airport has its fair share of on-time problems. The purpose of me writing this post is for you. If you want to have an on-time flight / connection, I would migrate away from Atlanta. I am not suggesting that you stop flying the carriers that are based there, but why not re-route a different way or explore a new hub? At this point, Atlanta is the airport you do not want to be at.
Airports change. Atlanta can easily get better as time moves forward – it’s a very congested airport. While on-board an AirTran Airways flight from Philadelphia to Atlanta, on my way to Daytona Beach (when they served it), the pilot announced that we may have to head to our alternate airport due to the heavy congested traffic flow inbound to Atlanta. I’m curious to know just how many flights actually do get diverted to their alternate airports.
| Flights with 70 Percent or More Delayed Arrivals (1st Quarter 2009: Jan-Mar 2009) |
