Carrier route record
OHMSP→DCA
PSA Airlines · Minneapolis to Washington
- Flights
- 483
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 19%
- Carriers
- 5
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with PSA Airlines.
PSA on MSP to DCA sits in the middle of the pack with a C−. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 5 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land about 2.7 hours behind schedule. That rests on 483 flights, with a median arrival 8 minutes early.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so PSA on MSP to DCA runs 5 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 49 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
72.7%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 451 completed flights
Avg delay
160 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
5.59%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
74.3%
Every carrier on MSP to DCA, 2,574 flights
These figures cover 483 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 12.0% 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 MSP to DCA
PSA flew 483 of the 2,574 flights on MSP to DCA, about 19% of it. Its 72.7% on time is 2 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 74.3%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number three of five carriers on the route, where the range runs from Delta at 75.6% to American at 61.5%. Three 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines | 1,695 | 75.6% | 60 min | 2.12% | B |
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 215 | 74.6% | 72 min | 5.58% | C− |
| PSA Airlines (this page) | 483 | 72.7% | 160 min | 5.59% | C− |
| Envoy Airthin sample | 140 | 66.7% | 66 min | 4.29% | C− |
| American Airlinesthin sample | 41 | 61.5% | 73 min | 4.88% | D− |
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 23 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–8am108 flights78.2%
- 8am–11am21 flights—
- 11am–2pm283 flights74.3%
- 2pm–5pm6 flights—
- 5pm–8pm65 flights55.2%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 45% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 55.2% on time, against 78.2% 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 11am–2pm window is the busiest, with 283 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
PSA on MSP to DCA through the year
December is the weak month at 54.0% on time, against 87.8% 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. June was the busiest month here, with 78 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 85.7% on time and Thursday the weakest at 65.7%. 20 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 42% 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.
- 42%Late-arriving aircraft
- 28%Carrier
- 15%Extreme weather
- 15%National Airspace System
Extreme weather accounts for 15% 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 2.5 times the usual weather exposure. The split is drawn from 19,729 reported delay minutes.
42% 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 20,000 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 5.59%, 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. 12.0% 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 931 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 69.5% on time across 483 flights, 3 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 3 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 483 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 MSP to DCA
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 5.59% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you about 2.7 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. 451 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- MSP to DCA, every carrier
- PSA on DCA to MSP, the return leg
- Delta Air Lines on MSP to DCA75.6%
- Republic Airways on MSP to DCA74.6%
- Envoy Air on MSP to DCA66.7%
- PSA Airlines network-wide record
- Minneapolis-St Paul International (MSP) delay statistics
- 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, July 2025 to June 2026. Last updated 15 September 2026; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.