On-time performance in February for North American carriers continued to improve after recovering in Januaryfollowing a big dip in December, according to the latest airline on-time report from aviation analytics company Cirium.
The carriers' weighted February on-time average improved 2.8 percentage points month over month to 76 percent. Alaska Airlines was first at 85.7 percent, followed by United Airlines (83.4 percent) and Delta Air Lines (82.5 percent).
Seven of the 10 reporting carriers improved in February, with Air Canada increasing the most from January—9.1 percentage points, to 65.5 percent, though it still came in last for the region. Southwest Airlines declined 3.1 percentage points from January, Spirit Airlines was down 2.3 percentage points, and JetBlue's on-time performance declined by 0.4 percentage points.
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United and Delta each made the February global list of on-time airlines in seventh and eighth place, respectively. (Alaska doesn't qualify as Cirium for its global list includes only carriers that serve at least four of its global regions.) Aeromexico again led the category at 91.6 percent.
Southwest's February completion factor was 99.2 percent. It was the second consecutive month as the only North American carrier with a completion factor above 99 percent. Alaska followed at 98.8 percent, with United at 98.2 percent.
The number of North American flights canceled in February was 18,080 compared with 34,161 in January. It was the second month in a row that North America had the highest number of cancellations of all the reporting regions.
A flight is considered on time if the aircraft arrives at the gate within 15 minutes of its scheduled arrival time.
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