Flight delay times not getting better

Last updated at 12:29 04 July 2006


Holiday flight punctuality worsened slightly at major UK airports in the first part of this year, it was announced today.

The number of charter flights arriving or leaving on time in January-March 2006 was 65 per cent compared with 66 per cent in the same period last year, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) said.

The average delay fell a little, though - from 28 minutes in January-March 2005 to 27 minutes in the first three months of this year.

Scheduled airline punctuality improved from an on-time figure of 73 per cent in January-March 2005 to 74 per cent in the same period this year. The average delay fell from 15 minutes in the first part of last year to 14 minutes this year.

The CAA statistics relate to flights in and out of Heathrow, Gatwick, Birmingham, Luton, Stansted, Manchester, Newcastle, Edinburgh, Glasgow and London City airports.

Among the top 75 scheduled and charter destinations, the scheduled routes to Istanbul, Mumbai (Bombay), Dubai, Toronto, New York (JFK airport), Madrid and New York (Newark airport) had on-time performances of less than 65 per cent

Five of these destinations - Istanbul, Mumbai, Toronto, New York (JFK) and Madrid - together with Malaga, had the highest average delays of 20 minutes or more for scheduled destinations.

Istanbul had both the lowest on-time performance and the longest average delay amongst the top 75 scheduled and charter destinations, with an on-time performance of 49 per cent and an average delay of 26 minutes.

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