Carrier route record
OHHSV→DCA
PSA Airlines · Huntsville to Washington
- Flights
- 1,001
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 76%
- Carriers
- 3
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with PSA Airlines.
PSA on HSV to DCA carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 4.4% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.8% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, about seven flights in ten 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 1,001 flights, with a median arrival 3 minutes early.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so PSA on HSV to DCA runs 8 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 79 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
69.7%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 954 completed flights
Avg delay
108 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
4.40%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
71.0%
Every carrier on HSV to DCA, 1,324 flights
These figures cover 1,001 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 14.2% 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
PSA against every carrier on HSV to DCA
PSA flew 1,001 of the 1,324 flights on HSV to DCA, most of the route. Its 69.7% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 71.0%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from Republic at 82.5% to PSA at 69.7%. 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 58 | 82.5% | 30 min | 1.72% | B |
| Envoy Airthin sample | 265 | 73.2% | 57 min | 5.66% | C− |
| PSA Airlines (this page) | 1,001 | 69.7% | 108 min | 4.40% | C− |
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 35 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am242 flights83.4%
- 8am–11am285 flights78.9%
- 11am–2pm275 flights63.2%
- 2pm–5pm27 flights—
- 5pm–8pm172 flights48.8%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 40% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 48.8% on time, against 83.4% 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 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 285 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
PSA on HSV to DCA through the year
September is the best month on the calendar at 81.5% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. March was the busiest month here, with 111 flights.
Across the week, Monday is the strongest day at 73.9% on time and Friday the weakest at 63.8%. 10 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why PSA runs late on this route
One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 48% of the 31,000 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.
- 48%Late-arriving aircraft
- 26%Carrier
- 14%Extreme weather
- 11%National Airspace System
- 1%Security
Extreme weather accounts for 14% of delay minutes, well above the single-digit share typical across the system. Weather delays are lumpy: they arrive as whole bad days rather than as a steady drag, so the monthly strip above is the more useful view of the risk. The national share is 6%, so this operation carries roughly 2.3 times the usual weather exposure. The split is drawn from 31,092 reported delay minutes.
48% 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 31,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 3 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.
Cancellations run at 4.40%, against 1.81% nationally. That is roughly one flight in 25 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. 14.2% 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.
The 613 miles between these two airports put this in the middle of the US network, around two and a half to three hours of block time. That is enough cruise to absorb a ten-minute late pushback and not enough to absorb thirty. It is also long enough that the aircraft usually flies three or four legs a day rather than six, which slows how fast delay compounds.
The return leg runs 70.4% on time across 999 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. 1,001 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 HSV to DCA
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 4.40% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you close to two hours; 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. 954 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.