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US News

JFK leaves passengers waiting on the tarmac more than any other airport in the US: study

By
Natalie O'Neill
Published May 3, 2024, 5:50 p.m. ET

This ain’t gonna fly.

More airplane passengers are left waiting on the tarmac at JFK airport than any other airport in the country, per a new study.

At the Queens-based travel hub last year, roughly 3,000 out of every 100,000 flights — or about three percent — suffered a frustrating passenger ordeal in which they were forced to wait for more than an hour before taking off or exiting at the gate, according to the travel research firm Upgraded Points. 

Newark and LaGuardia airports had the second and third highest rates of runway delays of longer than and hour, with 2,337 and 2,334 out of 100,000 respectively.

Philadelphia International Airport and Washington Dulles rounded out the top five, as each racked up about 1,600 tarmac delays of an hour or longer out of 100,000 flights.

JFK takeoff
More passengers are delayed at JFK than at any other US airport, according to new data. AFP via Getty Images

To put the numbers in context, JFK had 331,000 scheduled passenger flights in 2022, while Newark has 249,000 and LaGuardia had 171,000.

“Tarmac delays are on the rise again after plummeting due to decreased demand for air travel during the COVID-19 pandemic,” the report notes.

“Many airlines and airports substantially cut back staffing in response to decreased travel demand during the pandemic and were caught somewhat flat-footed when demand bounced back,” it adds.

Researchers analyzed data from the Bureau of Transportation Statistics’ Air Travel Consumer Reports and logged delays lasting longer than an hour to rank the airports.

JFK
Delays may have been due to airports still being short-staffed after the pandemic. Getty Images

Researchers chalked the waiting times up to the airports still being short-staffed after folks stopped traveling during the pandemic. 

Overall, tarmac delays roughly doubled from 2020 to 2021 and increased again by nearly half in 2022.

In 2023, delays on runways totaled about 65,000 nationwide, the report states.

The study also ranked airlines with the most tarmac delays, naming Jetblue as the worst offender with 1,228 delays per 100,000 flights.

United Airlines and American Airlines were ranked as third and fourth most delayed, followed by Delta, Frontier and Spirit Airlines.

“With airlines and airports continuing to staff back up to meet recovering demand, taxi-in and taxi-out tarmac delays have quickly risen since 2020,” the report notes.

“However, not all carriers and airports are equally impacted. Southwest and Hawaiian consistently experience the fewest tarmac delays among airlines.”

The Port Authority did not immediately respond to a request for comment.