Flight profile · American Airlines
AA2048
Phoenix (PHX) to Sacramento (SMF) · scheduled 8:20 PM – 10:52 PM
How AA2048 performs
747 operations, July 2023 – July 2026.
AA2048 arrived on time 76.1% of the time, against 81.0% for all PHX → SMF flights, so this departure is 4.9 percentage points worse than the route as a whole. Against American Airlines’ own flights on this route it is 4.7 points worse.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · 747 operations, July 2023 – July 2026 · If AA2048 is cancelled or significantly changed, DOT’s automatic refund rule may entitle you to your money back. The refund checker walks through eligibility.
Where AA2048 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AA2048 | 76.1% | 0.13% | -4 min | 9.0% | 747 |
| American Airlines on PHX → SMF | 80.8% | 0.19% | -6 min | 6.9% | 3,182 |
| All PHX → SMF flights | 81.0% | 0.21% | -5 min | 5.2% | 11,259 |
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026
Why AA2048 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 AA2048 on PHX → SMF. 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 AA2048 comes in late, and what that does to the departure.
When the aircraft came in 15 or more minutes late, AA2048 pushed back an average of 46 minutes late; when it came in on time or early, an average of 8 minutes late.
Each departure is matched to the flight the same aircraft flew into PHX just before it, using the tail number in the DOT file, 682 of 746 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA2048 | 21% | 61% | 16% |
| Network, same turn | 17% | 68% | 9% |
The schedule leaves a normal turn: enough time to clean and board if the aircraft is on time, little to spare if it is not.
The network row is every flight with a scheduled turn of 60 to 89 minutes. How often AA2048’s aircraft landed 15 or more minutes late is higher than the network’s and, once the aircraft was late, how often AA2048 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 PHX late, does that still matter by the time it reaches SMF?
AA2048 pushes back an average of 19.4 minutes late and reaches the gate at SMF an average of 14.3 minutes late. The 5.1 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 16.1 minutes on the taxiways at PHX is about what any departure from the airport in that hour spends.
On arrival at SMF, AA2048 spends 6.0 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 SMF 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 SMF. Taxi-out is gate to wheels up and sits inside the scheduled block rather than on top of it; the comparison is 32,500 departures from PHX scheduled in the clock hour AA2048 most often leaves in. Taxi-in is landing to gate, compared against every arrival FlyerIntel has on file at SMF (172,477 flights), not just AA2048’s own. More on taxi time.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026
The hour it leaves PHX
Part of any flight’s record belongs to the clock rather than to the flight. AA2048 has one departure time, so this is what that time is worth.
On-time arrival rate. 32,500 departures from PHX are scheduled in the 8 PM–9 PM hour over the period, against 598,518 across the whole day.
AA2048 is scheduled out of PHX at 8:20 PM, in the 8 PM–9 PM bank. Departures from PHX in that hour arrive on time 73.4% of the time against 80.3% across the airport’s whole day — the slot alone is worth 6.9 points worse before anything about this particular flight is considered.
The two airport figures cover every departure from PHX 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 AA2048 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| LAX→PHX Los Angeles to Phoenix | February 12, 2026 – May 14, 2026 | 26 | — |
| PHX→CLT Phoenix to Charlotte | March 8, 2026 – April 6, 2026 | 30 | — |
| LAS→PHL Las Vegas to Philadelphia | January 8, 2026 – February 9, 2026 | 20 | — |
| CLT→ORD Charlotte to Chicago | December 18, 2025 – January 5, 2026 | 19 | — |
| LAX→DFW Los Angeles to Dallas–Fort Worth | December 4–17, 2025 | 14 | — |
| RNO→PHX Reno to Phoenix | November 2, 2025 – December 2, 2025 | 31 | — |
| DFW→SAV Dallas–Fort Worth to Savannah | October 6, 2025 – November 1, 2025 | 27 | — |
| SAV→DFW Savannah to Dallas–Fort Worth | October 6, 2025 – November 1, 2025 | 27 | — |
| IND→PHL Indianapolis to Philadelphia | January 7, 2025 | 1 | — |
| LAS→LAX Las Vegas to Los Angeles | December 18, 2024 | 1 | — |
| PHL→CLT Philadelphia to Charlotte | December 4, 2024 | 1 | — |
| CLT→SDF Charlotte to Louisville | November 5, 2024 | 1 | — |
| ORD→JFK Chicago to New York | November 4, 2024 | 1 | — |
| CLT→CHS Charlotte to Charleston | October 31, 2024 | 1 | — |
| LAX→LAS Los Angeles to Las Vegas | September 4, 2024 | 1 | — |
| BOS→CLT Boston to Charlotte | August 6, 2024 | 1 | — |
Because the same number has served different journeys, the statistics above describe only the route AA2048 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.
51 min late
against a median of 4 min early
Percentiles over 747 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 747 records of AA2048 operating PHX → SMF, 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
Analysis last recomputed