Why flights get delayed

For example, in September , British Airways pilots decided to go on a 48 hour strike, which affected hundreds of thousands of passengers.

To many, these strikes are ill-understood and unleash a wave of discontent and rightly so among affected passengers. However, if one was to consider the dynamics of an industry which relies almost entirely on a workforce of specialists, it becomes clearer that staff does have a considerable amount of negotiation power.

At first sight, a strike is considered an extraordinary circumstance and no compensation is due if your flight has been affected. That being said, there are certain exceptions , which need to be considered. If a flight does not fall within the immediate strike period, but is disrupted, then the carrier cannot invoke the extraordinary circumstances clause and must honor your claim.

In certain cases, the airline may slightly delay the flight in order to board connecting passengers. As a general rule of thumb, carriers will not wait for connecting passengers. However, they seem to approach this on a case by case basis. Other circumstances which may lead a flight to wait for connecting passengers is if their slot time has been pushed back and will end up being delayed anyway. When passengers having one or multiple connections are traveling with checked-in luggage, it must also be transferred onto their next flight.

In some cases this may be the reason for a minor flight delay as ground handling will require a bit more time transferring the luggage. Just like the case of waiting for connecting passengers, this will be treated on a case by case basis.

That being said, it is highly unlikely that a flight will be delayed several hours because ground handling is transferring luggage. Commercial airlines are not only carrying passengers and their luggage. One of the most common examples is the US Postal Service which leases cargo space on 15, out of the 25, commercial passenger flights. Hence, a flight can sometimes be delayed because of the late arrival of freight.

In fact, passengers cannot begin boarding, unless that requirement has been met. In certain other situations, however, there's a chance that the crew may be arriving from another destination, and if that flight is delayed, so will be the crew. It is not impossible for a flight to be delayed by several hours if the crew is late. Regulations are set in place to ensure that members of the crew, meaning pilots and flight attendants, are well rested before the flight.

Sometimes the crew may max out their hours because of scheduling difficulties or a rotational delay a flight, which was delayed because of the late arrival of a previous flight. Another less known reason which may cause the delay of a flight is waiting for catering. The latter does not only include food, but also utensils, service ware, hygienic and miscellaneous items for assisting passengers. All of the above are managed by an airline catering agent, which is responsible for all aspects of catering line operations, such as loading and unloading equipment and supplies, driving large catering trucks, managing inventory, etc.

The list of things that need to happen before the engines of an aircraft are even turned on is long. In summary, some of the major events that take place are:.

Needless to say, there are a lot of things that have gone in preparation for each and every step and that will determine whether or not the aircraft can take off on time. For example, airline dispatch and operations control will decide and plan the route, which the aircraft will take, considering the weather conditions, fuel capacity, passenger load, etc.

The preparation for take off of your aircraft begins as soon as it lands. Some of the main activities are :. Once again, there are a lot of things that can delay the preparation of the aircraft, and consequently, its take off on time. Something as simple as not having the aircraft cleaned on time because of lack of staff, could have an impact on the boarding time, which can result in a flight missing its slot, etc.

It is rather rare but not impossible for a flight to be delayed by several hours because of issues surrounding preparation. Aircrafts are subject to very strict technical maintenance and rightly so. When the aircraft does not depart on-time, later-scheduled flights have to wait due to the backlog. The spacing interval between the takeoffs of the flights is fixed and cannot be compressed. As a result, all of the flights that are scheduled to arrive from the airport with the weather problems will arrive late.

And to further complicate things, the spacing of aircraft increases as the weather worsens. There are many factors that can cause air traffic, all of which have a direct impact on both arrivals as well as the departure time of flights. Air and ground congestion are a major factor why flights get delayed.

If a scheduled flight pushes back from the gate late, that flight could impact the departure of other flights, such as the next flight scheduled to arrive at the gate occupied by the late flight departure. Moreover, it causes disruptions in normal air traffic patterns. Flights that are arrived at the scheduled time might have to 'circle' around the airport area because of congestion.

Air traffic controllers have to hold some flights in a prescribed pattern before they are cleared to land. So, sometimes when you check on the status of the flight within 30 minutes of the scheduled arrival time, you may find a discrepancy. This is due to aircraft being placed in holding patterns around the airport may be reported as arrived, even though the flight is still in the air.

A go-around is a situation when an aircraft is just about to land at an airport, but the pilot judges that it is not safe to land.

In this case, the pilot initiates a go-around, which in reality means he will initiate a climb, and proceed to go back into the approach pattern to make another landing attempt - all guided by air traffic control. As you can imagine, this affects the arrival time for that flight, as it takes almost 30 minutes for the aircraft to return and land again. It also has the same accordion effect on other aircraft, which can trigger delays. Mechanical issues are, unfortunately, unforeseeable.

Once their hours are up and the aircraft still needs to service a flight, the airline has to scramble to find someone to replace the missing attendant. This is also another case in which airline management has to find someone to replace them. The pilot or attendant has to be certified to fly that specific type of plane, finding one might take some time.

Could this be a reason to make a claim after a flight delay? Worth compensation after a delay? File a Claim Loading Cargo The reason why a flight gets delayed could be because they are still loading cargo into the plane.

Not only is your plane carrying passenger luggage, it could also be carrying mail for some of the biggest postal services. They also have to consider the weight of every single package. Some of the reasons we stated above fall under this category.

File a Claim. That may be true, but the airline factors in the weather throughout the whole journey. If they anticipate bad weather along the way, the airline has to wait for it to clear up or cancel the flight entirely. Do adverse weather conditions mean you can get money due to a cancellation? In a lot of cases, most definitely. File a Claim Security Threat Airports and airlines take security very seriously. A bomb joke could result in you getting kicked off your flight, or worse, getting your flight cancelled —and all the passengers now hate your face.

Could a security threat get you compensation? Maybe, but you should probably check on that before attempting to make a claim. File a Claim IT Issues Surprise —all airlines have computer systems specifically designed to track flight schedules, staff schedules, air traffic, flight patterns, etc. Would this be grounds for a flight voucher or some form of payment for your troubles? Quite often, yes. To prevent further hassle, they might cancel that one flight in that location only.

Canada has similar regulations that came into effect in , as do other countries.