US: DOT's airline report shows late flights, cancellations and lost bags up

Airlines had a rough May, with more cancellations, more late flights and more mishandled bags than the month before, the Transportation Department announced Wednesday. Despite the performance, the number of complaints filed by consumers to the DOT dropped, according to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics. The 1,102 complaints were down from 1,169 in April and 1,784 in May 2017, according to the bureau’s Air Travel Consumer Report for May, the latest month for which federal data is available. The 17 airlines that report their reliability cancelled 1.2% of their domestic flights in May, according to the report. That’s up from 1% in April and 0.8% in May 2017. Delta held its usual perch with a statistical 0 percent of its flights cancelled, with only 23 scrapped in May. Hawaiian Airlines cancelled 0.1% of its flights and Allegiant Air cancelled 0.3%. Story has more statistics.<br/>