Carrier route record
OHDCA→BDL
PSA Airlines · Washington to Hartford
- Flights
- 984
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Share of route
- 59%
- Carriers
- 4
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with PSA Airlines.
PSA on DCA to BDL carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 8.1% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, about two flights in three arrive on time, worth a C− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 984 flights, with a median arrival 4 minutes early.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.3%, so PSA on DCA to BDL runs 10 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 95 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
67.8%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 904 completed flights
Avg delay
78 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
8.13%
National rate is 1.89%
Whole route
68.3%
Every carrier on DCA to BDL, 1,680 flights
These figures cover 984 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 13.6% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally.
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Carrier by carrier
PSA against every carrier on DCA to BDL
PSA flew 984 of the 1,680 flights on DCA to BDL, most of the route. Its 67.8% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 68.3%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number three of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from Envoy at 100.0% to American at 60.4%. Two of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.
Only one carrier clears this site's 365-flight floor here, so there is no comparison to draw. The table below is the full picture.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Envoy Airthin sample | 8 | 100.0% | — | 0.00% | A+ |
| Republic Airways | 402 | 74.0% | 54 min | 2.24% | C |
| PSA Airlines (this page) | 984 | 67.8% | 78 min | 8.13% | C− |
| American Airlinesthin sample | 286 | 60.4% | 73 min | 5.24% | D− |
Timetable by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
Departure window
When PSA runs best on this route
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 30 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am243 flights80.2%
- 8am–11am208 flights79.3%
- 11am–2pm104 flights70.1%
- 2pm–5pm72 flights59.2%
- 5pm–8pm162 flights50.4%
- 8pm–5am195 flights53.9%
Scale runs 40% to 85%.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 50.4% on time, against 80.2% for the 5am–8am slot. By evening the aircraft flying these rotations have absorbed a full day of small delays and there is no slack left to recover in. The 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 243 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
PSA on DCA to BDL through the year
December is the weak month at 50.6% on time, against 79.5% in January. Winter delays cluster: a single storm system can account for most of a month's shortfall, so an average December hides both very good weeks and genuinely unflyable days. July was the busiest month here, with 115 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 74.8% on time and Sunday the weakest at 59.5%, a spread of 15 points.
Arrival by arrival
How late PSA on DCA to BDL runs when it is late
PSA on DCA to BDL often beats the schedule: 247 of 904 completed flights, 27%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. The 291 late arrivals split 60 under half an hour, 108 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 123 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early247 flights27.3%
- Within 15 min366 flights40.5%
- 15–29 min late60 flights6.6%
- 30–59 min late108 flights11.9%
- 1–2 hours late69 flights7.6%
- 2+ hours late54 flights6.0%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 904 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
42 of 300 late departures made up the time and arrived on time, 14% of them. 33 flights left on time and still arrived late.
The worst days
Worst days for PSA on DCA to BDL
The latest arrival of the period was on 19 October 2025, 9 hours 42 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as carrier-caused (crew, maintenance, fuelling, baggage). On three of the five worst days the largest share was filed as a late-arriving aircraft.
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 19 October 2025 | 9 hours 42 minutes | Carrier |
| 18 March 2026 | 9 hours 29 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 21 July 2026 | 6 hours 6 minutes | Extreme weather |
| 10 June 2026 | 5 hours 49 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 9 August 2026 | 5 hours 19 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
Delay causes
Why PSA runs late on this route
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 58% of the 23,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 58%Late-arriving aircraft
- 24%Carrier
- 10%National Airspace System
- 7%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
58% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 23,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 9 to one. The split is drawn from 22,672 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 5am–8am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 80.2% on time here.
Cancellations run at 8.13%, against 1.89% nationally. That is about one flight in twelve cancelled outright. A cancelled flight is invisible in every on-time figure on this page, so the punctuality numbers above describe only the flights that actually operated.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here costs
13.6% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum for a connection here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.
At 313 miles this is a short hop, and stage length matters more than it looks. A flight this short spends under two hours in the air, which leaves almost nothing to claw back a late pushback with. Delay here is decided on the ground, in the turn, which is why the 5am–8am window matters as much as it does.
The return leg runs 67.5% on time across 986 flights, within half a point of this direction. The two legs are scored separately because they usually differ; on this city pair they happen not to.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 984 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor but not enough to pin the rate down tightly, and a single bad week moves it by more than a point. Treat the grade as a rough reading.
What to do with this
Booking PSA on DCA to BDL
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 8.13% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 5am–8am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 904 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- DCA to BDL, every carrier
- PSA on BDL to DCA, the return leg
- Republic Airways on DCA to BDL74.0%
- American Airlines on DCA to BDL60.4%
- PSA Airlines network-wide record
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, September 2025 to August 2026. Last updated ; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.