Fiscal 2023 DIF Account

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Airport Comment

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 So recently, I’ve been looking at the aircraft that JetBlue uses for the Worcester flight from JFK and FLL. The JFK flight that was suppose to arrive at 1130 or so last night is in the air heading to Worcester as this comment is being typed. Now airlines are known for having their planes do multiple runs in one day, but JetBlue seems to be a little excessive with this. 

Here’s why: the E190 is one of the oldest aircraft in JetBlue’s fleet and this is what the company expects this aircraft arriving into worcester to do all on time and all in one day. This aircraft went from Raleigh Durham to Cancun, then Cancun to Raleigh Durham, then Raleigh Durham to JFK, then JFK to Buffalo, then Buffalo to JFK, and finally JFK to Worcester. 

I don’t get the thinking of how an older aircraft is suppose to do 6 flights in 15 hours and all make it in time but I feel like that’s the issue with JetBlue and their delays, if one of those flights gets delayed, then it’s a domino affect for the rest which is exactly what happened.

That’s why you see the mid day turn have a better chance of being on time than the evening flight. But even then, on JetBlue’s website, the on time performance % for the mid day flight is only 37.5%?!? So people are more likely to not be in worcester when they’re suppose to be? 

Not good if you ask me. Even the FLL flight is only 56.25% with 31.25% of the time being delayed 30+ minutes. Doesn’t look good for an airline and scheduling when that’s happening. Which is also why they were ranked last place in on time performance. Yes, spirit had a better percentage of on time arrivals than jet blue did. 

 


 

Comments

Jake said…
Not sure where you got 37.5% on time for the midday JFK. Im seeing 58.3. In fact, late morning / midday arrivals to other cities show worse: BOS 54.8, ROC 57.1, SYR 53.5, CLE 55.1. Still, not too impressive for an airline. But as I said in a previous comment, lets not make this a Worcester problem. On time reliabilty Is about the same as other airports. In fact, fly out of Boston, no matter what airline and enjoy the PA.... ladies and gentlemen, welcome aboard, we're currently number 12 for take off. The E190 costs about $60 mil, and the older models have a range of only about 2000mi. So, short haul aircraft will have several cycles per day to offset its operating costs, regardless of the airline. Heck, in the early days of Southwest, they'd have up to 11-12 cycles per day hopping around Texas. Track any airline with short haul aircraft in their fleet. They all keep ground time to a minimum and work their planes throughout the day. So, if you think jetblue is excessive, check other airlines that have planes that operate similar stage length routes. In fact, check smaller aircraft like the E170 and see how many cycles they have. A suggestion to the administrator of this blog. Inaccuracies in comments are one thing, but when you make a comment into a post, you should be obligated to do some fact checking.
April 7, 2022 at 1:48 PM
Unknown said…
Thanks Jake!!! well said. Comparing heavily regulated airlines to a business such as retail is naive at best, and downright ignorant at worst. While the motive may be to find scapegoats for the unloved ORH's inability to gain traction with the public, spewing nonsense is not helpful.
April 7, 2022 at 3:26 PM
mv51691 said…
My morning flight to JFK was just cancelled. I usually fly out of Bradley or Boston, but figured I would five ORH a try. The easy drive seemed worth it, but the high risk of delays and cancellations makes this option much less appealing to me moving forward.
April 7, 2022 at 4:00 PM
Bill Randell said…
just so disappointing to see this happen over and over again
April 7, 2022 at 4:48 PM
Anonymous said…
So Jake and Unknown don't realize that data changes and the data for the mid day turn does change and this morning it did change. Based off of Jetblue's app when booking a flight, this is the data that's updated for the flights: Morning flight to JFK has a 60.714% on time arrival with 14.286% being delayed 30 minutes. Mid day turn to JFK for Jetblue has an on time arrival of 50% and is delayed 30+ minutes 33.33% of the time. When going from JFK to ORH, the mid day flight has a 58.33% on time arrival with 25% of the time being delayed 30+ minutes. The evening flight has a 42.857% arrival time with 28.571% of the time being delayed 30+ minutes. The Fort Lauderdale flight has a 75% on time arrival rate with 10.714% of the time being delayed 30+ minutes. The flight back to ORH has an on time percentage of 56.25% with 31.25% of the time being delayed 30+ minutes. For comparison, the delta flight is on time 77% of the time with 23% being delayed 30+ minutes. The american flight does not have any public data available.
Now I am not one to bash the airport. I was the same person who made the original comment on this post, and I do travel a lot for work and try to use Worcester when I can and visit the airport often and I wish there were more flights because Worcester can be a great option for a business/leisure traveler like me. The issue and reason why I fly out of Boston more than Worcester is 99% of the time, the people flying to New York are connecting to another flight. Worcester Airport is known for it's high winds and sometimes poor weather (fog is another issue) which can delay flights or cancel them. If people are going to try and use Worcester Airport for connections, and the flights keep getting delayed or cancelled, then they're going to go to Boston or somewhere else having more confidence they can make their connecting flight.
Another issue it can possibly be, the crews at the airport. On a typical day with the current schedule, all three mid day flights arrive and depart Worcester 30 minutes apart. Ever since American changed their flight schedule on Tuesday to where it is now, they have not been able to depart on time and today's flight got cancelled. I would say weather might've factored in, but Delta left on time today and Jetblue was delayed an hour (weather in New York was not the best). But there hasn't been a clear answer as to why Tuesday and Wednesday it couldn't leave on time and was delayed. Luckily the schedules change soon but it's still been not the best.
It can also factor whether another airline wants to fly out of Worcester. I would love for Worcester to have the same success as Bradley does north of Hartford but if an airline like Spirit or Southwest for example is looking and seeing that flights are being delayed and cancelled with no clear reason, they're going to question if it's really a good idea considering many flights from the area have left later than usual after arriving on time. I still think too if Worcester wants to go to leisure destinations like Orlando, Fort Myers, Myrtle Beach, etc. They should target Delta for it because Delta has a large variety of aircraft they could use from the A220-100 (same size as Jetblue's E190) to the Boeing 717 or 737. Plus, Delta has been matching Jetblue on fares to Worcester and they've been my go too for coming back home because unlike Jetblue, I don't have to pay $25-$55 extra to bring a carry on bag with me on the plane. I would never like to see ORH go downhill because it's a great airport, but the operations are not the best. There are definitely a lot of things you can say need improvements at the airport with marketing being the top thing, but if they want to bring new airlines in, they have to stop having flights arriving on time to ORH leave ORH delayed because of something going on at the airport.
April 7, 2022 at 8:38 PM
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