JetBlue Was Just Named the Worst Airline in America
The Wall Street Journal released their annual analysis of U.S. airlines today, and in a surprising turn of events, JetBlue Airways came dead last in the rankings.
While Delta unseated Alaska Airlines to take the title of America's best carrier, JetBlue fell three spots from last year's rankings to land behind the much-maligned Spirit and American Airlines this year.
If you've ever flown JetBlue, the rock-bottom ranking may come as a surprise, especially since the New York-based carrier shot up 14 spots in Skytrax's World Airline Awards in 2017 to 39 from 53, making it the third best low-cost airline in the world according to the international air transport rating organization.
In reader surveys, JetBlue also received top rankings, including the number two spot on both Travel + Leisure's World's Best List of top domestic airlines and Conde Nast Traveler's Readers' Choice Awards of the best airlines in the U.S. in 2017.
So what gives?
The Wall Street Journal looks at seven key operational metrics for their rankings, including on-time arrivals, canceled flights, extreme delays, 2-hour tarmac delays, mishandled luggage, involuntary bumping and complaints.
Even though JetBlue was the second best airline in 2017 for handling luggage and came in fourth when it came to the number of complaints received, it ran into major problems when it came to delayed and canceled flights last year. The carrier attributes those issues to the fact that the number of slowdowns that air-traffic control issued in New York-where JetBlue is based-doubled in 2017, The Wall Street Journal reports.
But they're working on it.
In addition to increasing their number of spare airplanes, they're also giving maintenance crews more time to make fixes after red-eye flights, Jeff Martin, JetBlue's executive vice president for operations, told The Wall Street Journal. They've also introduced new boarding procedures to help planes depart faster, as well as investing in new cockpit equipment so that flight-plan changes will be received electronically and not over the radio, which shaves minutes off delays.
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