Carrier route record
YXDCA→SDF
Republic Airways · Washington to Louisville
- Flights
- 441
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 43%
- Carriers
- 4
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Republic Airways.
Republic on DCA to SDF sits in the middle of the pack with a B−. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 2 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land a little over an hour behind schedule. That rests on 441 flights, with a median arrival 8 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate Republic on DCA to SDF from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
75.4%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 410 completed flights
Avg delay
79 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
6.80%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
75.1%
Every carrier on DCA to SDF, 1,031 flights
These figures cover 441 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 9.5% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule. That is the number that wrecks a connection, and it is not visible in an on-time percentage alone.
Carrier by carrier
Republic against every carrier on DCA to SDF
Republic flew 441 of the 1,031 flights on DCA to SDF, about 43% of it. Its 75.4% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 75.1%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number three of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from Envoy at 83.3% to PSA at 74.6%. 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 | 13 | 83.3% | 42 min | 7.69% | B− |
| American Airlinesthin sample | 5 | 80.0% | 66 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| Republic Airways (this page) | 441 | 75.4% | 79 min | 6.80% | B− |
| PSA Airlines | 572 | 74.6% | 61 min | 6.29% | C− |
Flight by flight
Republic flight numbers on DCA to SDF
Departure window
When Republic runs best on this route
Departure time is the single lever a traveller controls, and it moves the odds more than most people expect. Each bar below is the on-time rate for flights scheduled to leave inside that window, across 441 flights.
- 5am–8am—
- 8am–11am48 flights80.4%
- 11am–2pm23 flights—
- 2pm–5pm10 flights—
- 5pm–8pm208 flights73.3%
- 8pm–5am152 flights74.3%
Scale runs 65% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The early departures do better, though not dramatically: 80.4% on time for the 8am–11am window against 73.3% for 5pm–8pm. Worth taking if the schedule allows, not worth an extra connection. The 5pm–8pm window is the busiest, with 208 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
Republic on DCA to SDF through the year
December is the weak month at 60.0% on time, against 88.6% in May. 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. March was the busiest month here, with 58 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 86.0% on time and Wednesday the weakest at 67.8%. 18 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why Republic runs late on this route
One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 64% of the 7,955 delay minutes carriers reported, and the remaining four split what is left. The split is by minutes rather than by flights, so a few very long delays count for as much as many short ones.
- 64%Late-arriving aircraft
- 16%Carrier
- 10%National Airspace System
- 10%Extreme weather
64% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. That is a cascade, and cascades start small and grow through the day. Across 7,955 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 7 to one. It is the strongest argument for booking the first departure of the morning, when the aircraft has been sitting at the gate overnight with nothing to inherit. The split is drawn from 7,955 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 8am–11am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 80.4% on time here.
Cancellations run at 6.80%, against 1.81% nationally. That is about one flight in fifteen 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
For anyone connecting, the number to weigh is not the on-time rate but the tail behind it. 9.5% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.1% nationally. A 45-minute layover does not survive that, and no amount of walking quickly changes it. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.
At 474 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 8am–11am window matters as much as it does.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 86.3% on time across 439 flights, 11 points above this direction. Departure banks, aircraft rotations and the congestion at each end all differ, so scoring the two directions together would average away a real 11 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 441 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 Republic on DCA to SDF
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 6.80% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 8am–11am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 410 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, July 2025 to June 2026. Last updated 15 September 2026; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.