Carrier route record
OHMKE→DCA
PSA Airlines · Milwaukee to Washington
- Flights
- 659
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 49%
- Carriers
- 3
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with PSA Airlines.
PSA on MKE to DCA 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 about 2.2 hours behind schedule. That rests on 659 flights, with a median arrival 7 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate PSA on MKE to DCA from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
75.8%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 621 completed flights
Avg delay
134 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
5.46%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
75.4%
Every carrier on MKE to DCA, 1,349 flights
These figures cover 659 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 11.3% 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 MKE to DCA
PSA flew 659 of the 1,349 flights on MKE to DCA, about 49% of it. Its 75.8% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 75.4%. Ranked by on-time rate it is first of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from PSA at 75.8% to Republic at 57.1%. One 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA Airlines (this page) | 659 | 75.8% | 134 min | 5.46% | B− |
| Southwest Airlines | 683 | 75.1% | 58 min | 1.90% | B |
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 7 | 57.1% | 31 min | 0.00% | D+ |
Flight by flight
PSA flight numbers on MKE to DCA
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 15 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–8am352 flights83.1%
- 8am–11am1 flights—
- 11am–2pm306 flights67.7%
- 2pm–5pm—
- 5pm–8pm—
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 60% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The weak window here is the middle of the day, not the evening: 11am–2pm runs 67.7% on time against 83.1% for 5am–8am. That shape usually means a departure bank rather than an accumulating delay, so the recovery later in the afternoon is real rather than noise. The 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 352 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
PSA on MKE to DCA through the year
December is the weak month at 44.2% on time, against 86.0% in July. 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 82.0% on time and Wednesday the weakest at 69.3%. 13 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. Carrier accounts for 54% of the 20,000 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.
- 54%Carrier
- 31%Late-arriving aircraft
- 13%National Airspace System
- 3%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 54%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. Unlike weather, that is a management outcome, and it is the category where the gap between two carriers on the same schedule is genuinely earned. It accounts for 11,000 of the 20,000 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 20,130 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 83.1% on time here.
Cancellations run at 5.46%, against 1.81% nationally. That is roughly one flight in twenty 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. 11.3% 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 634 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 is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 71.3% on time across 659 flights, 5 points below 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 5 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 659 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 MKE to DCA
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 5.46% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you about 2.2 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. 621 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.