Delayed Flights?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

I was reading another thread (on Greyhound) on this forum and while not a major topic of conversation, peopled complained about airline delays a few times. I see this all the time, and as a frequent traveler, I just have to say “what?”

I travel by air roughly 40 times per year and if I have one legitimate delay per year I’d be surprised. If it’s snowing a foot and a half where you are or where you’re going, that’s not a delay, nobody could do anything about it, especially the airline. They have rules and are left to the discretion of the airports. I don’t considered anything less than 45 minutes to be a delay. That can usually be made up on your leg of the flight and it’s also usually weather related.

Granted, I usually fly between major cities on major airlines, but they can get caught up quickly. Those are usually weather related too, but on the very rare mechanical situation, they bring in a new plane.

If you’re flying out of Butte, MT on the one flight they have a day, give yourself a built in time buffer. They have far fewer employees than the big airports, so just because it is a small town, don’t expect to fly into the parking lot, drop off your rental car, and stride up to baggage check all in 25 minutes. You have one or two TSA agents vs. a dozen or two in Denver.

Air travel takes some time, even when everything is running smoothly. You’re not the only one running late, there are a dozen of you.

Are people really suffering constant delays or is it confirmation bias?

2

If my plane arrives at its destination behind schedule, that’s a delay, no matter what the reason. I don’t blame the airline for weather-related delays, but those are still delays.

You’re right, brief departure delays can often be recovered in the air, resulting in an on-time arrival. Like you, I haven’t experienced many late arrivals, despite doing plenty of flying in all seasons.

3

My experience is similar to yours. I don’t fly as often as you; maybe one trip a month on average. Delays and actual cancellations have been very rare in my experience. What is distressingly common is not boarding on time, which annoys me. Because I have my home terminal’s layout memorized and I know exactly how long it takes to get from the fancy business-class lounge to my gate, and I want to get there and walk right onto the plane. Inconsiderate jerks!

4

It used to be an hour flight was billed as an hour, now it’s 1:20 or 1:30. A marketing genius idea in that if the plane really is late they still get to report it on time. :rolleyes:

I’ve had multiple instances of the crew timing out after a delay, which meant hours, or even overnight, until a reserve crew could be brought in. Not so bad if you’re in your airline’s hub city; lousy otherwise.

I think it’s quite the opposite, I think you’re being far too forgiving. They’re a professional organization spending probably millions of dollars to complete a schedule to get a plane from A to B to C to D in a day. They do this every day, for years; they should know that, say leaving at 5pm from JFK there’s going to be a delay getting into the air & should accommodate that into their schedule, & therefore, should be on time but they run so tight, that morning fog on the other side of the country can delay your plane coming from North/South of where you are later in the day.

5

I think you are lucky. Because I only fly a few times a year and in the past ten years I’d say I’m at a 5% “over an hour” delay rate. Twice with kids - stuck in an airport for eight hours with kids is no fun for anyone. Or maybe I’m unlucky. There is nothing like starting your vacation half a day late because the pilot didn’t show up to fly the plane.

6

This web site might help to bring some objectivity to the discussion:

Bureau of Transportation Statistics: Airline On-Time Statistics and Delay Causes

Pick an airline, an airport, and a timeframe, and you’ll see what’s really happening. It may be helpful to first read their companion FAQ:

Understanding the Reporting of Causes of Flight Delays and Cancellations

7

I’m not exactly dispassionate about the subject, after an airline* delayed and then cancelled a flight that my son was on. Or rather half a flight… they got him halfway across the country, then just said “Sorry, we’re cancelling the next leg of the flight for no reason. We can book you on our next flight FIVE DAYS from now…” (they only flew Thursdays and Tuesdays)

He’d saved his own money for the flight, and they said “Sorry, no refund.” He had to pay for a last-minute flight from another airline.
*An airline that hadn’t quite grasped the spirit of customer service…

8

The one thing I’ve never experienced is arriving with an adequate but small amount of time before boarding, and that’s partially due to delays. I’m usually at least an hour early so even with devices I get bored before the boarding because you can’t really relax and get into anything because you have to keep checking on your flight. The four or five times I’ve made it with less than 15 minutes before boarding, 1 time I missed my flight, once I got there during boarding, and the other times the boarding was delayed so I needed to chill for an extra half hour to several hours anyway :rolleyes:

9

When buying a ticket on a budget airline such as Spirit this is one of the known tradeoffs you make. They will only put you on another Spirit flight; regular airlines have arrangements with other carriers to get you on any flight available. Budget airlines know exactly what customer service is but they operate in a different service category; the general public needs to understand what budget airline means.

10

In traveling by air 2-3 times a month, I experience a significant delay (more than 30 minutes) at least one flight in five. I’ve been grounded overnight at PHX more times than I can count over the past few years by Southwest massively overbooking flights in expectations of delays, and Delta has stranded me three times in about the last two years due to mechanical failures that caused the to ground the plane and have another one flown in from a different airport. American, though, is the absolutely fucking worst, even more terrible than Frontier (which I fly only when it has the only direct flight to someplace I need to get to quickly); I’ve literally sat on the tarmac for over an hour on seven different flights with American over the past decade because of various problems “waiting for a gate to open up” because of how little time the budget for their planes to be at gates and thus, don’t lease enough gate space for their flight volume.

The one airline I’ve never had a problem with is Virgin Atlantic. Except for that stupid mood lighting that is supposed to make it seem like you are in a dance club, it is just about the perfect airline, and their upgrade costs to domestic first class are actually reasonable enough that I’m willing to pay it out of pocket for a long flight. Unfortunately, they fly to exactly none of the places I need to go for work, and so I’m stuck with some combination of American, Delta, United, and Southwest, all of whom could collectively not give two shits about customer satisfaction.

Now can we talk about the TSA? Because…

Stranger

11

I don’t fly quite that often anymore (probably one round trip every other month), but that proportion sounds about right for me, as well.

An example from two weeks ago:

I was flying home (to ORD) from Birmingham, Alabama, on United. We left the gate in Birmingham on time, taxied out towards the runway, and then sat for 15-20 minutes. I figured that there was a traffic delay up in Chicago, as Birmingham is a very quiet airport, but I also knew that the weather in Chicago wasn’t an issue. However, the flight crew didn’t tell us anything about the delay.

We finally started moving again, and the pilot finally let us know what was going on. There was some piece of maintenance paperwork which needed to be on the plane, but which the ground crew had neglected to actually give to the flight crew before we departed. We taxied back to the gate, and waited for someone to bring the paperwork to the plane. We then departed – again – and took off about 35 minutes late, but the pilot assured us that we’d still be getting to Chicago at or around our scheduled arrival time (bear in mind that published flight times in and out of ORD usually seem to have about a half-hour of padding in them).

We did, in fact, land at ORD a few minutes before the scheduled arrival time…and then we sat on the tarmac for over a half-hour, because there was a plane stuck at our intended gate with its own mechanical / maintenance issue (and, ORD being as busy as it is, there apparently wasn’t an open gate to spare). When we finally reached the gate, we were about 40 minutes late.

I don’t encounter major delays (i.e., more than an hour or two) more than once every year or two; the worst ones in recent memory were a flight home from Birmingham that got delayed for several hours due to a maintenance issue, before being cancelled entirely (I wound up leaving on the next plane out, which was about 12 hours after my original departure time), and having to drive home from Orlando in 2014, because a disgruntled air traffic controller tried to blow himself up along with a radar facility.

12

I fly 2 to 3 round trips per month. Like the OP, I don’t get many unexplained delays. Last week, for example, they canceled my flight out of Charlottesville due to windstorm. I’m fine with that, but there was a 2 hour hold to talk to a person about alternative plans. (the app would allow me to rebook–two days later, but that’s not what I wanted to do). There really is no excuse for not ramping up customer service capacity when a weather event hits.

My other rant is that I really wish the flight crew would do a better job telling us what they know when we’re sitting around at the gate or on the runway. Please acknowledge the delay and explain/apologize. Don’t just say “thanks for flying with us, have a great day.” While I’m ranting, what fries by goat is when I’m standing at the gate waiting to board and it’s 30 minutes past departure time and the damn screen says “on time.”

13

Yes and no.

As someone who routinely flies into/out of a small airport. I think you minimize the ease at which you can get that time buffer; when there’s one flight a day, you often have to make the choice between a 1 hour layover and a 6 hour layover. Yeah, the 6 hour one will get you to your destination on time with little risk, but 6 hours rambling around O’Hare gets very, very old.

On the other hand, I also routinely get to the airport about 20-30 minutes before my flight. It’s literally drive up, park in front of the airport, hop out, and walk onto my plane. Sure, returning a rental car would take longer, but still… the TSA line never takes more than 5 minutes.

14

<click>
Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. There is no cause for alarm. Thank you…
</click>

15

I went through the TSA Precheck process a couple of years ago, to get a Known Traveler Number, which definitely makes it a lot faster to get through security at ORD. OTOH, when I come back through Birmingham, it’s a matter of the Precheck line having no one waiting at all, versus the “normal” security line having a half-dozen people in line, tops. :slight_smile:

16

Like you, I am a frequent business traveler. I think people who travel frequently as a part of their work have a very different perspective on the inconveniences of air travel and a better understanding of the impacts to our travel plans. Simply put, we do this all the time and know when a “delay” is inconsequential and when a “delay” is going to have immediate and short term repercussions. As such, I think we tend to take this all in stride much easier than the person who travels 1x a year and books travel on price (usually meaning terrible flight departure/arrival times, short connections, etc.) and who react the most loudly to any perceived delay.

17

Did the name of that airline start with “A”?

18

With the new rules delays often turn into cancellations because they don’t want to risk sticking people on the plane for five hours and getting fined.
The flight I was on last week was delayed 45 minutes or so after we boarded due to mechanical problems, but since they made up the time and I made my connection, I don’t even count it. But I’ve been delayed overnight twice, my daughter was delayed 3 or 4 days in the Heathrow snow disaster, and we were delayed for hours on the way to Vancouver for a cruise. We did stuff before so we were okay, but the people trusting enough to be taking the cruise that evening were very nervous. It happens often enough that we always arrive a day before the cruise departs now.

Anyone who flies any amount who has not experienced delays that screw up plans is very lucky.

19

That’s not in the Spirit of the thread. But Allegiant does the same stuff. It’s all part of the budget airline experience.

20

My understanding is that there’s a history behind this. Back in the old days before airlines were required to track and report on-time performance, airlines used to compete based on departure times and on shortest flight durations. It would be common for a large airport to have more flights scheduled between, say, 5:00 PM and 5:10 PM (or other popular business travel departure time) than could ever taxi and take off in that time. So even with an on-time push back the chances that that flight with the popular departure time and the short published duration was anything more than marketing were pretty slim.

Personally I prefer “realistic” scheduling even when it results in arriving 20 or even as much as 30 minutes ahead of its published time.