On June 15, 2013, a JetBlue Airways plane parked at the gate of John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York.
Fred Prosser | Reuters
Ministry of Transport fines JetBlue Airways The U.S. Department of Transportation said on Friday it was fining $2 million for “prolonged flight delays,” the first penalty of its kind.
The U.S. Department of Transportation said that between June 2022 and November 2023, four routes operated by JetBlue were delayed at least 145 times. The flights operate between JetBlue’s headquarters, John F. Kennedy International Airport, and Raleigh-Durham International Airport in Raleigh, North Carolina; between Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and JFK Orlando; and Windsor Locks, Connecticut.
“Today’s action puts the entire airline industry on notice that we want their flight schedules to reflect reality,” Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said in a press release.
The Department of Transportation said JetBlue was responsible for more than 70% of the disruptions on the four routes. The airline failed to adjust flight times “to avoid illegal and unrealistic scheduling,” the department added.
DOT considers a flight to be chronically delayed if it flies at least 10 times a month and more than half of those flights are more than 30 minutes late. The company said it was investigating other airlines’ unrealistic flight schedules.
The government must do more to improve air traffic controller staffing and modernize systems, JetBlue said in a statement, echoing calls from JetBlue executives Delta Air Lines, United Airlines and other major carriers.
“While we have reached settlements regarding four flights in 2022 and 2023, we believe the responsibility for reliable air travel equally lies with the U.S. government that operates our nation’s air traffic control system,” JetBlue said in a statement. “We believe the United States deserves to have the safest, most efficient, and most advanced air traffic control system in the world, and we urge the incoming administration to prioritize modernizing outdated air traffic control technology and addressing the chronic air traffic controller staffing shortage issues to reduce the number of air traffic control delays that affect millions of air passengers every year.”
Headquartered in New York, JetBlue operates in some of the most congested airspace in the world. According to monthly data from the Department of Transportation, JetBlue ranked ninth among 10 U.S. airlines in on-time arrivals from January to September 2024, with an on-time flight rate of 71.3%, an increase of 64.9% from the same period last year. consistent.
The DOT said it will pay JetBlue a $1 million fine to reimburse goodwill compensation already paid to passengers during the investigation, as well as provide voucher payments of at least $75 to affected passengers within one year of the order. compensation.
