The U.S. Department of Transportation has sued Southwest Airlines and fined Frontier Airlines for “chronically delayed flights,” the agency announced Wednesday. The moves come after DOT fined JetBlue $2 million earlier in January for the same issue.
A “chronically delayed flight” is defined by DOT as one operated at least 10 times in a month and that arrives more than 30 minutes late, including canceled flights, more than 50 percent of the time during the month.
“Airlines have a legal obligation to ensure that their flight schedules provide travelers with realistic departure and arrival times,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said in a statement. “Today’s action sends a message to all airlines that the Department is prepared to go to court in order to enforce passenger protections.”
The Southwest suit, filed in the Northern District of California, cites two routes with chronic delays that resulted in 180 flight disruptions between April and August 2022: between Chicago’s Midway International Airport and Oakland, Calif., and between Baltimore and Cleveland.
In the court filing, DOT said that after “having operated these chronically delayed flights for four consecutive one-month periods … Southwest continued to hold out these flights without adjusting their schedules, and they continued to be chronically delayed.”
DOT is requesting civil penalties to the United States up to the maximum amount by law for each violation listed in the case.
Southwest responded in a statement that it is “disappointed that DOT chose to file a lawsuit over two flights that occurred more than two years ago. Since DOT issued its Chronically Delayed Flight policy in 2009, Southwest has operated more than 20 million flights with no other CDF violations. Any claim that these two flights represent an unrealistic schedule is simply not credible when compared with our performance over the past 15 years. In 2024, Southwest led the industry by completing more than 99 percent of its flights without cancellation.”
Frontier Fined
DOT on Wednesday also fined Frontier Airlines $650,000 for three chronically delayed flights between August 2022 and April 2023. Half of the fee is to be paid to the U.S. Treasury and the remaining half would be suspended if the carrier does not operate any chronically delayed flights in the next three years, according to DOT.
The three Frontier routes cited were Atlanta-Phoenix, Houston-Orlando, Fla., and between Orlando and St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands. Frontier in a consent order said many of the flights at issue were delayed or canceled because of uncontrollable events. Further, the carrier “has decided to resolve this matter without any admission of liability on the terms herein in order to avoid the additional expense, burden, and distraction of additional litigation.”
The carrier declined further comment.
