Carrier route record
OHSDF→DCA
PSA Airlines · Louisville to Washington
- Flights
- 544
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Share of route
- 53%
- Carriers
- 4
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with PSA Airlines.
PSA on SDF to DCA sits in the middle of the pack with a C−. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 4 points worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land close to two hours behind schedule. That rests on 544 flights, with a median arrival 7 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.3%, so there is little to separate PSA on SDF 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
73.4%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 507 completed flights
Avg delay
107 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
6.62%
National rate is 1.89%
Whole route
78.2%
Every carrier on SDF to DCA, 1,025 flights
These figures cover 544 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 10.5% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally.
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Carrier by carrier
PSA against every carrier on SDF to DCA
PSA flew 544 of the 1,025 flights on SDF to DCA, most of the route. Its 73.4% on time is 5 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 78.2%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number three of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from Envoy at 91.7% to American at 60.0%. 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.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Envoy Airthin sample | 13 | 91.7% | 38 min | 7.69% | A− |
| Republic Airways | 463 | 83.4% | 53 min | 2.16% | B |
| PSA Airlines (this page) | 544 | 73.4% | 107 min | 6.62% | C− |
| American Airlinesthin sample | 5 | 60.0% | 69 min | 0.00% | D+ |
Timetable by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
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.
- 5am–8am—
- 8am–11am117 flights86.0%
- 11am–2pm167 flights81.5%
- 2pm–5pm163 flights58.6%
- 5pm–8pm97 flights69.2%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 50% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 86.0% of the time, against 58.6% for the afternoon window. That is 27 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 11am–2pm window is the busiest, with 167 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
PSA on SDF to DCA through the year
February is the weak month at 62.9% on time, against 86.7% in October. 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. October was the busiest month here, with 60 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 88.7% on time and Sunday the weakest at 67.6%, a spread of 21 points.
Arrival by arrival
How late PSA on SDF to DCA runs when it is late
PSA on SDF to DCA often beats the schedule: 186 of 507 completed flights, 37%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. The 135 late arrivals split 43 under half an hour, 39 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 53 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early186 flights36.7%
- Within 15 min186 flights36.7%
- 15–29 min late43 flights8.5%
- 30–59 min late39 flights7.7%
- 1–2 hours late30 flights5.9%
- 2+ hours late23 flights4.5%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 507 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
19 of 116 late departures made up the time and arrived on time, 16% of them. In the other direction, 38 flights left on time yet arrived 15 minutes late or more, so that delay built up after pushback: in the air, in a holding pattern or on the ground at DCA.
The worst days
Worst days for PSA on SDF to DCA
The latest arrival of the period was on 18 June 2026, 21 hours 24 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as carrier-caused (crew, maintenance, fuelling, baggage). The same cause led on four of the five worst days.
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 18 June 2026 | 21 hours 24 minutes | Carrier |
| 4 November 2025 | 20 hours 48 minutes | National Airspace System |
| 6 April 2026 | 19 hours 26 minutes | Carrier |
| 20 May 2026 | 17 hours 30 minutes | Carrier |
| 14 May 2026 | 13 hours 11 minutes | Carrier |
Delay causes
Why PSA runs late on this route
Carriers report a reason for every delay minute they cause, in five DOT categories. The split below is by minutes, not by number of flights, so a handful of very long weather delays weighs as much as many short ones. It covers 14,000 reported delay minutes.
- 41%Late-arriving aircraft
- 33%Carrier
- 26%National Airspace System
- 0%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
41% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 14,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 41 to one. The split is drawn from 14,425 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 86.0% on time here.
Cancellations run at 6.62%, against 1.89% 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
10.5% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum for a connection 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 76.7% on time across 544 flights, 3 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 3 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 544 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 SDF to DCA
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 6.62% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you close to two hours; 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. 507 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, September 2025 to August 2026. Last updated ; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.