10,100 late flights for Canada’s biggest airline in June as numbers drop for both major carriers
Published July 15, 2024 at 2:02 pm
More than 10,100 Air Canada flights arrived late at their destination in June in a month that saw this country’s two biggest carriers drop significantly in rankings that track the on-time performance of North America’s 10 major airlines.
Air Canada, which operates more flights out of Pearson Airport in Mississauga than out of any other airport, landed 69.6 per cent of its 33,373 June flights on time, according to aviation data firm Cirium’s latest monthly On-time Performance Report (see charts below).
That means just over 30 per cent, or 10,146 flights, were late getting to their destination, meaning 15 minutes or more past scheduled arrival time.
Air Canada’s most recent on-time arrival rate placed it ninth in Cirium’s June rankings, more than five per cent better than Denver-based Frontier Airlines and its third-consecutive last-place showing (64.18 per cent of 20,134 flights were on time).
Canada’s flagship carrier fell from its sixth-place showing in May, when it landed 74.05 per cent of its 33,070 flights on time. In April, those numbers were 75.22 per cent of 30,913 flights, which placed Air Canada ninth.
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Meanwhile, WestJet, Canada’s second-largest airline, dropped to seventh place in June from its second-place showing in April and third-place ranking in May.
The Calgary-based carrier, which also operates many of its flights out of Pearson, landed 71.95 per cent of its 16,876 flights on time in June, the report shows.
WestJet’s numbers in May were 77.55 per cent of 16,348 total flights and the April data showed the carrier landed 82.7 per cent of its 15,085 flights on time.
In both February and March, WestJet placed 10th on the on-time performance list, according to Cirium.
U.S.-based Delta Air Lines (80.05 per cent of 148,781 flights on time) finished first once again in June, its 10th consecutive month in top spot. Alaska Airlines (77.79 per cent of 38,364 flights) placed second while United Airlines (77.44 per cent of 136,737 flights) was third.
Air Canada consistently found itself at or near the bottom of the OTP monthly rankings throughout 2023 and numbers measuring on-time performance for all of 2023 placed Canada’s biggest airline at the bottom of the rankings for the entire 12-month period, Cirium data revealed earlier.
Each month, Cirium ranks the 10 largest airlines in a given region around the world based on their on-time performance rate.
Its numbers from June show of the 762,572 flights across North America (10 airlines combined), 73.15 per cent arrived on time. That’s down slightly from May numbers that show 74.43 per cent of 758,039 flights were on time.
April numbers showed 79.72 per cent of 724,130 North American flights hit the tarmac safely and on time.
Airlines’ on-time performance for December 2023, February 2024, March 2024, April 2024, May 2024 and June 2024 appear above. Numbers for January 2024 were not made available. (Source: Cirium Aviation Analytics)