JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Jacksonville International Airport ranked among the lowest number of tarmac delays for medium airports, according to a new study about tarmac delays in the U.S. from Upgraded Points.
Online complaints about travel delays have become more and more frequent in the last five years, with a total of 83,000 tarmac delays in the U.S. in 2019. Tarmac delays — which are when passengers are on a plane and waiting for takeoff or are waiting to deplane after it has landed — approximately doubled from 2020 to 2021, the report said.
Delays increased again by nearly half in 2022, and they totaled over 65,000 in 2023.
Jacksonville International Airport, however, ranked 22nd on a list of most tarmac delays among medium-size airports in the U.S.. This put it at having the 13th fewest delays on its list.
Many factors that contribute to delays are outside the airport's control, said Greg Willis, marketing and public relations manager for Jacksonville Aviation Authority.
For example, thunderstorm activity may increase delays in the summer for JAX while the winter months may see more delays for other airports that have to contend with snow storms.
"While our operations team does its best to maximize gate utilization for our airlines to help ensure on-time departures, there are many factors that may contribute to delayed flights," Willis said.
JAX had about 243 departure delays under one hour out of every 100,000 flights and about 306 arrival delays out of every 100,000 flights for the year.
By comparison, all U.S. airports average 750 departure delays and 200 arrival delays under one hour for every 100,000 flights, the report showed.
Airline-specific delays also appeared to be a trend in the report, with JetBlue seeing the most departure delays at 1,228 for every 100,000 flights. Frontier and Spirit had the most arrival tarmac delays, with 441 and 409, respectively.
Hawaiian Airlines had the lowest numbers of delays with 80 departure and 87 arrival tarmac delays per 100,000 flights, followed by Southwest Airlines with the next lowest numbers.
