Carrier route record

OHPWM→DCA

PSA Airlines · Portland to Washington

Flights: 394
Period: July 2025 to June 2026
Share of route: 34%
Carriers: 4

Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with PSA Airlines.

PSA on PWM 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, 8 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land close to two hours behind schedule. That rests on 394 flights, with a median arrival 2 minutes early.

The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so PSA on PWM to DCA runs 8 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 75 extra late arrivals.

On time

70.1%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 368 completed flights

Avg delay

102 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

5.84%

National rate is 1.81%

Whole route

74.5%

Every carrier on PWM to DCA, 1,153 flights

These figures cover 394 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 13.0% 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 PWM to DCA

PSA flew 394 of the 1,153 flights on PWM to DCA, about 34% of it. Its 70.1% on time is 4 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 74.5%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number three of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from Republic at 81.1% to Envoy at 50.0%. 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.

On-time performance by carrier on PWM to DCA
Airline	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
Republic Airwaysthin sample	100	81.1%	79 min	5.00%	B−
American Airlines	655	76.1%	112 min	2.29%	B
PSA Airlines (this page)	394	70.1%	102 min	5.84%	C−
Envoy Airthin sample	4	50.0%	22 min	0.00%	F+

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 27 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–8am80 flights86.8%
8am–11am9 flights—
11am–2pm110 flights74.0%
2pm–5pm70 flights63.2%
5pm–8pm125 flights60.3%
8pm–5am—

Scale runs 50% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 60.3% on time, against 86.8% 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 5pm–8pm window is the busiest, with 125 flights scheduled in it.

Across the year

PSA on PWM to DCA through the year

Jul–Sep 202576 flights68.1%
Oct–Dec 202548 flights75.6%
Jan–Mar 2026106 flights66.3%
Apr–Jun 2026164 flights71.8%

Scale runs 60% to 80%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

Monthly volumes are too low here to break the year into twelve reliable readings. What the twelve-month total says is 70.1% on time across 394 flights.

Quarter by quarter PSA on PWM to DCA held fairly steady: 68.1% in Jul–Sep 2025, 75.6% in Oct–Dec 2025, 66.3% in Jan–Mar 2026 and 71.8% in Apr–Jun 2026. A spread of 9 points is about what a sample of this size moves on its own, so the annual figure is a fair summary.

Across the week, Sunday is the strongest day at 79.0% on time and Wednesday the weakest at 62.7%. 16 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 11,000 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.

Late-arriving aircraft
48%
Carrier
26%
National Airspace System
22%
Extreme weather
2%
Security
2%

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 11,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 20 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 11,166 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 86.8% on time here.

Cancellations run at 5.84%, against 1.81% nationally. That is roughly 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. 13.0% 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.

At 482 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 is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 66.7% on time across 394 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. 394 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 PWM to DCA

Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 5.84% 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. 368 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.

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.

Key figures