After Covid-19 shut down all airports, a recent travel surge has seen many delayed flights, paired with lost baggage. From early in 2022 to mid-July, 23% of all flights in the U.S. have been disrupted or delayed, according to FlightAware. Willis Orlando, a senior flight expert, suggests that larger city airports such as D.C., LA, and Chicago are more likely to experience flight delays/disruptions. Also, Frontier, Southwest, and American Airlines are the most likely airlines to kick out their passengers. In April of 2022, around 220,000 bags were mishandled, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation.   

During this time, lots of people had issues with losing their baggage. Overall, 6/1000 bags in February were lost. According to William McGee, the senior fellow for aviation at the American Economic Liberties Project. 

“The system is now operating beyond its capacity.  This is the worst summer meltdown for airline customer service in the 37 years I’ve spent working in, writing about, and advocating about the airlines,”  McGee stated on the AELP website.

In the June 2022 Air Travel Consumer Report, JetBlue and Spirit were the airlines that struggled the most. JetBlue had a 53.3 percentage of on-time arrivals, while on the other hand, Endeavor Air (part of the Delta corporation) at 85%. 

On the point of canceled flights, JetBlue and Spirit had the highest percentages, with 9 and 10.3 percent of their operations getting canceled, respectively.  While on the flip side, Delta network had the lowest of all airlines with only 1.1 percent. Southwest and United airlines combined caused 8/10 of the longest delays, and half of these flights were out of Newark Airport. The longest delay was a United Flight on the 7th of April, 2022, which was delayed by four hours and twelve minutes. Overall, it seems that JetBlue and Spirit have been the worst flights.

Student Arham J. flew to India over the summer, and his flight delay had some major effects on his family’s overall trip. At the airport, the Air India flight had a delay of about an hour, and on top of that, the baggage was delayed when they landed in Delhi. This caused his eagerly awaiting family, including his elderly grandparents, to change their sleep times and drive to pick up Arham and his family early in the morning.