Flight profile · Delta Air Lines
DL2491
Charlotte (CLT) to Minneapolis (MSP) · scheduled 6:20 AM – 8:08 AM
How DL2491 performs
1,022 operations, July 2023 – July 2026.
DL2491 arrived on time 93.8% of the time, against 80.8% for all CLT → MSP flights, so this departure is 13.0 percentage points better than the route as a whole. Against Delta Air Lines’ own flights on this route it is 8.1 points better.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · 1,022 operations, July 2023 – July 2026 · If DL2491 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 DL2491 compares to other flight numbers, not just to itself.
This flight runs unusually far ahead of the CLT → MSP route as a whole, better than 96% of 11,788 comparable flight numbers.
93.8% on time for this specific departure, against 80.8% for every CLT → MSP flight.
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 DL2491 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DL2491 | 93.8% | 1.27% | -12 min | 2.8% | 1,022 |
| Delta Air Lines on CLT → MSP | 85.7% | 0.71% | -11 min | 5.6% | 3,945 |
| All CLT → MSP flights | 80.8% | 1.04% | -8 min | 6.6% | 7,760 |
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026
Why DL2491 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 DL2491 on CLT → MSP. 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 DL2491 comes in late, and what that does to the departure.
DL2491 is usually the aircraft’s first flight of the day: the schedule gives it a median of 7.1 hours on the ground at CLT, so its “inbound” is mostly the aircraft’s arrival the evening before.
When the aircraft came in 15 or more minutes late, DL2491 pushed back an average of 9 minutes late; when it came in on time or early, an average of 1 minute late.
Each departure is matched to the flight the same aircraft flew into CLT just before it, using the tail number in the DOT file, 988 of 1,009 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| DL2491 | 22% | 9% | 5% |
| 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 DL2491’s aircraft landed 15 or more minutes late is lower than the network’s and, once the aircraft was late, how often DL2491 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 CLT late, does that still matter by the time it reaches MSP?
DL2491 pushes back an average of 4.6 minutes late and reaches the gate at MSP an average of 4.6 minutes early. The 9.2 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. It spends 17.5 minutes on the taxiways at CLT, 1.4 minutes shorter than a typical CLT departure in the same hour.
On arrival at MSP, DL2491 spends 5.7 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 1.0 minutes shorter than a typical MSP arrival (6.8 min).
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 MSP. Taxi-out is gate to wheels up and sits inside the scheduled block rather than on top of it; the comparison is 9,517 departures from CLT scheduled in the clock hour DL2491 most often leaves in. Taxi-in is landing to gate, compared against every arrival FlyerIntel has on file at MSP (369,815 flights), not just DL2491’s own. More on taxi time.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026
The hour it leaves CLT
Part of any flight’s record belongs to the clock rather than to the flight. DL2491 has one departure time, so this is what that time is worth.
On-time arrival rate. 9,517 departures from CLT are scheduled in the 6 AM–7 AM hour over the period, against 618,243 across the whole day.
DL2491 is scheduled out of CLT at 6:20 AM, in the 6 AM–7 AM bank. Departures from CLT in that hour arrive on time 91.3% of the time against 74.8% across the airport’s whole day — the slot alone is worth 16.5 points better before anything about this particular flight is considered.
The two airport figures cover every departure from CLT 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.
By day of week
Does DL2491 run worse on particular days?
Thursday is historically the most reliable day and Tuesday the least, a gap of 5.5 percentage points.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026 · Days with fewer than 120 operations are not scored.
Other routes DL2491 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| ATL→LEX Atlanta to Lexington | December 19, 2024 | 1 | — |
| LEX→ATL Lexington to Atlanta | December 19, 2024 | 1 | — |
| ATL→HSV Atlanta to Huntsville | October 9, 2023 – December 15, 2023 | 54 | — |
| DTW→GRR Detroit to Grand Rapids | October 10–28, 2023 | 6 | — |
| GRR→DTW Grand Rapids to Detroit | October 10–28, 2023 | 6 | — |
| FLL→JFK Fort Lauderdale to New York | September 5, 2023 – October 8, 2023 | 34 | — |
Because the same number has served different journeys, the statistics above describe only the route DL2491 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.
7 min late
against a median of 12 min early
Percentiles over 1,022 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 1,022 records of DL2491 operating CLT → MSP, 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