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Commercial flights arrived at Philadelphia on time 75.2 percent of the time, up from 69.2 percent in May last year.
Planes left on time 79 percent of the time, an improvement over the 74 percent on-time departures in May 2007, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation's Air Travel Consumer Report.
Despite progress, Philadelphia International still ranked 25th in on-time arrivals and 24th in on-time departures among 32 airports. May is the most recent month for which statistics were available.
US Airways, which carries two-thirds of Philadelphia passengers, ranked fourth among the 10 largest U.S. airlines, with on-time arrivals of 83.6 percent.
Hawaiian and Pinnacle airlines topped the overall list. Only AirTran, Skywest and Delta had better on-time arrivals than US Airways among major airlines.
Philadelphia International's improved on-time record "is really good news," said James M. Tyrrell, the city's deputy aviation director.
He cited US Airways' on-time trend, a move by airlines to reduce capacity -- seats and flights -- and the Federal Aviation Administration's air-space redesign for the East Coast aimed at easing air-traffic congestion.
Could Philadelphia ever be a top 10 airport in on-time performance?
The goal is laudable, but would be tough to achieve, Tyrrell said. Philadelphia is "hemmed in" between New York and Washington and deals with heavy traffic volume and weather issues -- thunderstorms, snow and cold that cause delays.
"You would always expect airports in the Sun Belt, like Orlando, Los Angeles, Phoenix, to have better on-time performances," Tyrrell said, "because they have fewer weather occurrences."
Salt Lake City had the best on-time record for May; Newark, N.J., had the worst.
American Airlines, the nation's largest airline, had the worst on-time record, getting passengers to their destinations as scheduled only 67.3 percent of the time. American was followed by United Airlines, the second-largest carrier, which reported 72.4 percent of on-time arrivals, and Continental Airlines, with 75.4 percent.
Airlines improved their baggage handling in May. About 4.6 passengers out of every 1,000 reported a mishandled bag during the month, compared with nearly 6 per 1,000 a year earlier.
Reports of mishandled baggage by US Airways improved in May to about 3.86 reports per 1,000 passengers from 7.17 reports a year ago.
Reported passenger complaints fell to 885 in May from 930 a year earlier.
US Airways, based in Tempe, Ariz., ranked ninth in customer complaints among the 10 largest carriers.
US Airways logged 93 complaints in May, a rate of 1.94 per 100,000 passengers, compared to 136 passenger complaints in May 2007. Delta Air Lines had the most complaints: 127 customer gripes, a rate of 2.14 per 100,000.
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On-Time Arrivals
Flights arriving at Philadelphia International Airport in May within 15 minutes of schedule.
Airline On-time %
Frontier 83.9
Delta 82.4
US Airways 78.5
ExpressJet 76.7
Southwest 76.4
AirTran 75.7
AtlanticSoutheast 72.4
SkyWest 71.2
Continental 70.1
Pinnacle 70.0
Comair 69.0
Northwest 67.9
United 66.4
American 60.8
PHL Airport on-time arrivals:
May 2007 69.2%
May 2008 75.2%
PHL Airport on-time departures:
May 2007 74.0%
May 2008 79.0%
SOURCE: U.S. Dept. of Transportation
Contact staff writer Linda Loyd at 215-854-2831 or lloyd@phillynews.com.
To see more of The Philadelphia Inquirer, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.philly.com. Copyright (c) 2008, The Philadelphia Inquirer Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.
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