No matter how low cheap airplane tickets or cheap vacation packages are priced, no price can be cheap enough to offset the frustration of sitting on a runway for three or more hours prior to being let off a plane. Only three flights sat on runways in excess of three hours in June vs. almost 300 last year in June. Things are definitely looking up.
When the new runway penalty rules were instituted the end of April, airlines cried wolf. They warned that many more flights would have to be cancelled, which they said would not be in passengers best interest, in order to avoid facing potentially massive fines for excessive runway delays. Fortunately this did not prove to be the case in June.
The three flights that violated the excessive runway rule had the following in common:
All were operated by United
All were flying out of Chicagos OHare airport on June 18th
None were more than five minutes over the maximum allowed wait of three hours.
Thunderstorms and strong winds that day were blamed for the delays. Two of the three flights suffering from excessive delays were later canceled.
United reported that it gave passengers on these planes food, drinks and regular updates. Compensation was provided to passengers on its canceled flights.
268 flights sat on runways in excess of three hours in June of 2009. Having only three this June is all the more impressive given that June is one of the busiest months of the year for air travel and one of the stormiest months of the year.
The airline cancellation rate in June for scheduled domestic flights was 1.5 percent, the same as last year.
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