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Flying friends, please gather around. We have some bad news to deliver. A recent FlightAware report has named the worst airports in the world in terms of delays and cancellations, and the number one airport on the list is in North America. It’s lodged in a charming world-class city that you would never suspect of such a downfall. And yet... it's our sad duty to tell you that Toronto’s Pearson International Airport is the worst in the world.
Why? Because more than half of its flights were delayed. An eyebrow-raising 52.5 percent of its flights were delayed during the period FlightAware studied, from May 26 to July 19, which brings us right up to last week. Wisely, the airport is now showing you on its home page its ‘peak times’ so you can maybe work around those busiest flights to improve your changes of sitting on an on-time aircraft. It’d be good to know how much of a delay is entailed; a ten minute wait is negligible, while a delay of several hours can spoil all the fun and make connections tight or impossible. According to FlightAware, a delay consists of anything greater than 15 minutes.
The second and third most delayed airports were Frankfurt, Germany, with 45.4 percent of flights delayed, and Paris’s Charles de Gaulle, with 43.2 percent. You’ll be pleased to hear that no other North American airport hits the list until the #10 spot, which is Orlando International in Florida.
As far as outright cancellations, again here Toronto is a visible head-shaker. It comes in at number four on that list, with 6.5 percent of flights never leaving the tarmac. (We do have to point out that Newark Liberty International is number two, just behind Shenzhen Bao’an International, with 7.4 percent cancellations). We’ve got two more North American airports in this top ten list: LaGuardia at number three (7 percent) and Washington Ronald Reagan National Airport at number eight (5 percent).
Read about the full worldwide list here. And maybe... just don't look at your watch.