1 in 4 flights out of Houston's George Bush Intercontinental Airport delayed this year, feds report

HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) -- As residents get ready for a record-shattering holiday travel season, 13 Investigates looked into what types of delays travelers can expect.

AAA projects 7.5 million people will travel by air this holiday season, surpassing the 2019 record of 7.3 million passengers.

Based on AAA booking data, the company said Houston is among the top 10 domestic locations for travelers.

13 Investigates wanted to know just how often travelers can expect their flights to be on time and dug through federal U.S. Department of Transportation data, which shows delays are becoming more common at Houston's George Bush Intercontinental Airport.

Last year, Bush was one of the best-performing airports for on-time arrivals, according to U.S. Department of Transportation data.

More than 80% of flights that landed at Bush between January and the end of September last year were on time. But, when looking at the same time period this year, it was slightly down, with 76% of flights arriving on time.

It's the same for departing flights, where 79% were on time last year and 74% were on time this year.

ABC13 wanted to know the cause of the delays and found about 7% of flights arriving at Bush were delayed for issues caused by the airline, such as a late cabin crew.

Another 7% were due to delays with the National Aviation System, including severe weather in other parts of the country that caused a ripple effect on services.

There were another 7% of flights that were delayed because an aircraft coming into Houston, for whatever reason, experienced a delay earlier in the day and was behind schedule. Less than 1% of flight delays were due to weather in Houston or because of security issues.

The U.S. Department of Transportation ranked the 30 biggest airports in the country from best to worst when it comes to departure delays, and Bush came in at the bottom half at 20th.

Flight delays were the most common out of Las Vegas, Denver, Baltimore, and Orlando. Fort Lauderdale was the worst, with just 64% of departing flights on time.

The top five airports with the fewest delays were airports in Detroit, Dulles in Washington, D.C., Salt Lake City, Minneapolis, and Seattle.

13 Investigates also wanted to look into staffing shortages at air traffic control towers.

The air traffic control tower that guides aircraft landing and taking off at Bush has 78 controllers, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. The target is 93 controllers, but the FAA tells us there are 13 controllers in training working here who are experienced and fully certified at other towers.

"The FAA is taking immediate action to recruit, train, and hire more air traffic controllers. We launched a year-round hiring track for experienced controllers from the military and private industry. We are filling every seat at the FAA Academy and expanding the use of advanced training in locations throughout the country. We're also working with colleges and universities in the Air Traffic-Collegiate Training Initiative Program to ensure graduates have the skills to immediately begin on-the-job training at a facility," according to a statement from the FAA. "We hired 1,500 controllers this year and plan to hire 1,800 next year. Despite a major increase in flights this year, delays and cancellations remain lower than even pre-pandemic levels."

13 Investigates also put in public records requests to see if there have been any near-misses between aircraft flying in airspace that's within 100 miles of Bush and Hobby airports. There were just three incidents of pilots reporting they spotted a drone in the airspace.

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