Flight profile · American Airlines
AA1178
Washington (DCA) to Miami (MIA) · scheduled 5:00 AM – 7:39 AM
How AA1178 performs
726 operations, July 2023 – July 2026.
AA1178 arrived on time 91.4% of the time, against 77.2% for all DCA → MIA flights, so this departure is 14.2 percentage points better than the route as a whole. Against American Airlines’ own flights on this route it is 13.7 points better.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · 726 operations, July 2023 – July 2026 · If AA1178 is cancelled or significantly changed, DOT’s automatic refund rule may entitle you to your money back. The refund checker walks through eligibility.
What stands out
How AA1178 compares to other flight numbers, not just to itself.
This flight runs unusually far ahead of the carrier's own average on this route, better than 97% of 11,589 comparable flight numbers.
91.4% on time for this specific departure, against 77.7% for the same carrier's other flights on this route.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026 · The one thing about this specific departure that ranks most extreme against every other published flight number, out of everything FlyerIntel checks — shown only when something clears a real statistical bar, not for every flight.
Where AA1178 is right now
A live reading, only if you ask for it. It is not part of the reliability record above.
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Against the rest of the route
| Flight or route | On time | Cancelled | Median delay | Severe | Flights |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AA1178 | 91.4% | 2.62% | -14 min | 3.1% | 726 |
| American Airlines on DCA → MIA | 77.7% | 2.18% | -9 min | 9.2% | 10,818 |
| All DCA → MIA flights | 77.2% | 2.09% | -9 min | 9.4% | 11,971 |
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026
Why AA1178 runs late
Where US DOT attributed the delay minutes on this flight.
crew, maintenance, boarding and fueling, all within the carrier’s control
the inbound aircraft was late, so this flight started late
airspace and airport capacity, including weather-driven flow control
weather severe enough to stop this flight specifically
Share of the delay minutes US DOT attributed to each cause for AA1178 on DCA → MIA. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
Does a late aircraft delay this flight?
How often the plane that flies AA1178 comes in late, and what that does to the departure.
AA1178 is usually the aircraft’s first flight of the day: the schedule gives it a median of 6.8 hours on the ground at DCA, so its “inbound” is mostly the aircraft’s arrival the evening before.
When the aircraft came in 15 or more minutes late, AA1178 pushed back an average of 4 minutes late; when it came in on time or early, an average of 6 minutes late.
Each departure is matched to the flight the same aircraft flew into DCA just before it, using the tail number in the DOT file, 695 of 707 departures in all. A departure is left out when that flight is unknown, was cancelled or diverted, or the aircraft had sat for more than 12 hours. A flight the airline cancelled never left and is not in the count, and one flown by a substitute aircraft is matched to the aircraft that flew it, not to the one first planned.
Against the network at the same turn length
| Share of departures | Inbound landed 15+ late | Left 15+ late after a late inbound | Left 15+ late after an on-time inbound |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA1178 | 35% | 8% | 11% |
| Network, same turn | 29% | 12% | 9% |
A night on the ground absorbs most of a late arrival, so a late inbound matters far less on a turn this long than on a same-day one.
The network row is every flight with a scheduled turn of 6 hours or more, usually overnight. How often AA1178’s aircraft landed 15 or more minutes late is higher than the network’s and, once the aircraft was late, how often AA1178 left 15 or more minutes late is lower than the network’s.
More: Which Flight Numbers Pay for a Late Aircraft lists the flight numbers that pass a late aircraft on.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
From pushback to gate
When it leaves DCA late, does that still matter by the time it reaches MIA?
AA1178 pushes back an average of 6.6 minutes late and reaches the gate at MIA an average of 4.2 minutes early. The 10.8 minutes between those two figures are slack the published schedule already carries, which is why a late pushback on this flight does not reliably become a late arrival. Its 15.5 minutes on the taxiways at DCA is about what any departure from the airport in that hour spends.
On arrival at MIA, AA1178 spends 9.2 min taxiing from touchdown to the gate — ground time a connecting passenger sits through before they can even leave the aircraft, on top of however late the flight itself ran. That is about what any arrival at MIA spends on the ground before reaching the gate.
Departure delay is averaged over every pushback and arrival delay over every completed arrival, so the two counts differ by the flights that never reached MIA. Taxi-out is gate to wheels up and sits inside the scheduled block rather than on top of it; the comparison is 3,116 departures from DCA scheduled in the clock hour AA1178 most often leaves in. Taxi-in is landing to gate, compared against every arrival FlyerIntel has on file at MIA (340,467 flights), not just AA1178’s own. More on taxi time.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026
The hour it leaves DCA
Part of any flight’s record belongs to the clock rather than to the flight. AA1178 has one departure time, so this is what that time is worth.
On-time arrival rate. 3,116 departures from DCA are scheduled in the 5 AM–6 AM hour over the period, against 435,076 across the whole day.
AA1178 is scheduled out of DCA at 5:00 AM, in the 5 AM–6 AM bank. Departures from DCA in that hour arrive on time 91.6% of the time against 76.5% across the airport’s whole day — the slot alone is worth 15.1 points better before anything about this particular flight is considered.
The two airport figures cover every departure from DCA to every destination, so they describe the slot rather than this journey — the like-for-like comparison against the route is above. Hours are scheduled local, and a number whose schedule moved between banks inside the period has no single hour and is not described here at all. Why the hour matters.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026 · Hours below 120 departures are not scored.
Other routes AA1178 has flown
A flight number is a slot in a schedule, and carriers reassign it. These are the other city pairs this number served in the analysis period.
| Route | Operated | Flights | On time |
|---|---|---|---|
| DFW→SEA Dallas–Fort Worth to Seattle | March 8, 2026 – April 6, 2026 | 22 | — |
| DFW→ORD Dallas–Fort Worth to Chicago | March 9, 2025 – March 28, 2026 | 22 | — |
| LAX→ORD Los Angeles to Chicago | November 3, 2025 – March 7, 2026 | 90 | 76.1% |
| RNO→PHX Reno to Phoenix | December 18, 2025 – January 5, 2026 | 17 | — |
| DCA→BNA Washington to Nashville | October 11–31, 2025 | 4 | — |
| ORD→IAH Chicago to Houston | February 13, 2025 – March 5, 2025 | 21 | — |
| CLT→SDF Charlotte to Louisville | November 5, 2023 – February 12, 2025 | 103 | 87.4% |
| SDF→CLT Louisville to Charlotte | November 5, 2023 – February 12, 2025 | 101 | 81.0% |
| MIA→MSY Miami to New Orleans | December 20, 2024 – January 6, 2025 | 7 | — |
| MSY→MIA New Orleans to Miami | December 20, 2024 – January 6, 2025 | 7 | — |
| JAX→MIA Jacksonville to Miami | December 19, 2024 – January 4, 2025 | 10 | — |
| MIA→JAX Miami to Jacksonville | December 19, 2024 – January 4, 2025 | 10 | — |
| LAX→DFW Los Angeles to Dallas–Fort Worth | June 5, 2024 | 1 | — |
Because the same number has served different journeys, the statistics above describe only the route AA1178 currently operates. Blending them would produce an average of two different flights.
When it goes wrong
The average describes a usual day. This is the day that ruins a connection.
9 min late
against a median of 14 min early
Percentiles over 726 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
Other flights on this route
Same airports, same journey, different odds of arriving on time.
| Flight | Airline | On time | Median arrival | Operations |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| AA1178 this flight | American Airlines | 91.4% | 14 min early | 726 |
| AA422 | American Airlines | 81.2% | 7 min early | 627 |
| DL2576 | Delta Air Lines | 71.6% | 6 min early | 808 |
Every departure listed carries at least 600 operations, so the comparison is between figures that mean something. AA1178 is placed in the same ordering rather than left out of it; the rows around it are the most punctual departures on the route, not all of them, so this is a comparison and not a rank. Schedules change; confirm the departure still operates before booking around this.
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 726 records of AA1178 operating DCA → MIA, published by the US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics. A flight counts as delayed when it arrives 15 or more minutes after schedule. Cancelled and diverted flights are excluded from the on-time rate and reported separately. Flight numbers are resolved as carrier plus number plus route, because the same number serves different routes over time.
Full methodology · Data sources · Report a problem
Related research: Most and Least Reliable Flight Numbers · The Delay You Inherit · Making Up Time in the Air
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