Australia’s worst performing airline for cancellations and delays last month is revealed

Qantas canceled almost six percent of all domestic flights last month and about one in four were late as the embattled airline tried to deal with prolonged pilot strikes.

New data from the Bureau of Infrastructure and Transport Research Economics shows that airlines underperformed in February.

The data showed that only 74 percent of flights departed or arrived on time and four percent were canceled by airlines before takeoff.

‘The cancellation rate was higher than the long-term average of 2.2 percent. ‘

Qantas was the worst airline for late landings and canceled flights, with only 72.7 percent of flights arriving on time and 5.8 percent canceled straight away.

The airline blamed seven 24-hour strikes by pilots in Western Australia for the reliability problems, which resulted in more than one in 20 flights being canceled.

Qantas was the biggest offender in terms of late landings (only 72.7 percent of flights arrived on time) and cancellations (one in twenty were canceled)

The majority of cancellations affected passengers traveling on the QantasLink regional arm.

“We had to cancel almost 550 flights due to seven 24-hour strikes, accounting for more than half of our total cancellations for the month,” Qantas operations center chief Daniel Dihen told 9 News.

“We also moved three Qantas Boeing 737s to Western Australia to help rehouse customers and operate mining charter flights, which also impacted on-time performance across our wider network.”

Mr Dahien added that these problems should not be allowed to continue as all strike action has since been called off and schedules have returned to normal.

Qantas’ chief operations officer said several 24-hour strikes by pilots in Western Australia were responsible for the high cancellation rate

Rex canceled only 2.1 percent of flights in February and 72.1 percent of their trips arrived on time

Qantas is hopeful it can return to pre-coronavirus levels of reliability, with flights running on time almost 80 percent of the time.

Other airlines generally fared better, with the exception of Virgin, which landed and departed only 71.5 percent of its flights on time.

Rex ensured that 72.1 percent of its flights arrived on time, while Jetstar performed even better, with 76.1 percent of its flights arriving without delays.

However, Bonza outperformed both with 81.7 percent of flights arriving on time, making it the best performer of the month.

In terms of cancellations, Rex had the lowest rate at 2.1 percent, followed by Bonza at 2.5 percent, Jetstar at 2.6 percent and Virgin at 2.8 percent.