Airline Tarmac Delays Down In June, DoT Reports

On Tuesday, the Department of Transportation released their report on June airline statistics. It is the first report since the new rule prohibiting airlines from keeping full planes on the tarmac for longer than three hours was passed on April 29th.

While much of the report states the obvious--the three flights with 3-hour delays were all United flights leaving Chicago O'Hare when a severe thunderstorm hit--it might also give travelers an insight into the best airlines to pick if they want to avoid delays.

1.5% of all scheduled domestic flights were canceled in June, similar to the rate before the law went into effect. Overall, airlines were 76.4% on time.

The report goes on to discuss discrimination, mishandled bags and complaint reports, but what really caught our eye is that there were 6 incidents death of a pet (up, they were keen to note, from 5 in June 2009).

If being punctual is your thing, Hawaiian Airlines boasted 93.6% on-time arrivals, followed by Alaska (88.9%) and U.S. Airways (83.4%)--and Conair (64.9%), AmericanEagle (67.9%) and ExpressJet (69.7%) on the flip side.

Comair, American Eagle and Pinnacle had the highest rate of canceled flights, with rates at 4%, 3.8% and 2.5%, respectively. Continental, Hawaiian and AirTran had the lowest rates of canceled flights with .1%, .1% and .3%, respectively.