Some surprises in new list of world’s most on-time airports
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New data from the flight-data and travel analytics company Cirium shows international airports are leading the way for on-time performance. Sheremetyevo Airport (SVO) in Moscow topped the rankings with a 95% on-time departure rate. That’s quite a feat considering it’s also the busiest of Moscow’s four airports. Tocumen International Airport in Panama City (PTY) ranked No. 2 with a 93% on-time rate. Interestingly, no American airport made the top 10. In fact, the only American airports in the top 20 were Honolulu’s Daniel K. Inouye International Airport (HNL) at No. 19 and Salt Lake City International Airport (SLC) at No. 20.
As we reported yesterday, Delta was the most on-time North American airline. And as we previously reported, Aeroflot was the most punctual in the world.
Cirium wrote,
“Sheremetyevo International Airport (SVO) had over 315 flights per day in 2019. SVO’s new third runway clearly offers relief — and some much-needed new capacity at Russia’s busiest airport. Aeroflot, the largest carrier at the airport, maintains nearly 84% of the total operations at SVO. With a carrier owning such a lion’s share of operations at one airport, it stands to reason that as Aeroflot goes, so does SVO. Well done to SVO’s Management for keeping all three runways operational year-round and Aeroflot’s network planning and operations teams who have worked hard to fine-tune their schedules and operations in order to keep the aircraft flying in and out of Sheremetyevo as scheduled.”
Eight of the top 10 large airports for on-time performance are based in China.
The most surprising findings may be how few American and Western European airports made the cut in any of the rankings of the best.
Among medium-size airports, Kaohsiung International Airport (KHH) in Taiwan took the top honors. Despite only operating from one runway, Taiwan’s second-largest airport kept congestion to a minimum. The only U.S. airport in the top 10 was in Idaho — Boise Air Terminal at Gowen Field (BOI).
Finally, among small airports Thailand’s Koh Samui Airport (USM) was tops with 95% of flights leaving on time.
Five of the top 10 airports in this category are in Japan: Yulin Yuyang Airport (UYN), Nagasaki Airport (NGS), Miyazaki Airport (KMI), Kumamoto Airport (KMJ) and Matsuyama Airport (MYJ).
Jeremy Bowen, Cirium CEO, said: “Airlines and airports which consistently operate on time and go that extra mile for their customers deserve to be recognized in an increasingly competitive environment and should be justifiably proud of reaching such a world-class industry standard.”
Cirium analyzed 600 sources and more than 100,000 flights a day to compile the ratings.
(Photo illustration courtesy Cirium)
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Additional reporting by Victoria Walker.
Featured image courtesy Anton Novoderezhkin/TASS via Getty Images.
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