NYC Airports Worst For Delays; Salt Lake City Best

New York, NY (AHN) - Metro New York airports are the worst for arrival delays. What a surprise. Salt Lake City International, on the other hand, is the best.

So goes the latest survey by the flight-tracking service FlightStats. JetBlue Airways had the worst on-time performance. The best? It's Southwest Airlines.

Among the 40 busiest airports in North America, John F. Kennedy International in New York City was clearly the worst of the worst, with less than 55 percent of its flights on time, followed by NYC's LaGuardia Airport with 58.43 percent of its flights arriving on time. Newark International was third from the bottom with a 60.23-percent on-time arrival rate. The average on-time rate for all 40 airports combined was 74.35 percent. Rounding out the top five were Boston's Logan International and Miami International.

Salt Lake City International was the top performer with 88.99 percent of its arrivals on time, followed by Memphis International at 84.21 percent, and third was Metropolitan Oakland International in California, with an on-time arrival rate of 83.41 percent. Rounding out the top five were Detroit and Portland, Ore., according to FlightStats, owned by Conducive Technology Corp.

In terms of major airlines, JetBlue was the worst performer in July for arrivals, 64.98 percent. The industry average was 74.79 percent. In terms of annual sales, however, JetBlue is one of the nation's 10 largest airlines.

FlightStats said the airline industry made good on its July performance compared to the previous month and for the same period a year ago.

"That shouldn't be a surprise given that [in June] the industry appeared to be hitting bottom in many respects and last summer was often described as the 'summer from hell,' a period that spawned the passenger's bill of rights movement and caused the FAA to step in and put a cap on traffic at some of the busiest airports," the FlightStats report said.