Flight profile · Delta Air Lines
DL2497
San Antonio (SAT) to Detroit (DTW) · scheduled 5:15 AM – 9:24 AM
How DL2497 performs
785 operations, June 2024 – July 2026.
DL2497 arrived on time 94.5% of the time, against 89.0% for all SAT → DTW flights, so this departure is 5.5 percentage points better than the route as a whole. Against Delta Air Lines’ own flights on this route it is 5.6 points better.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · 785 operations, June 2024 – July 2026 · If DL2497 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 DL2497 compares to other flight numbers, not just to itself.
This flight stays close to typical even on its worst days, a smaller gap than 97% of 11,788 comparable flight numbers.
A typical arrival is 12 min early, and the worst tenth are only 17 minutes worse than that.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · June 2024 – 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 DL2497 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DL2497 | 94.5% | 1.02% | -12 min | 2.2% | 785 |
| Delta Air Lines on SAT → DTW | 88.9% | 0.88% | -11 min | 4.1% | 2,850 |
| All SAT → DTW flights | 89.0% | 0.87% | -11 min | 4.1% | 2,884 |
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · June 2024 – July 2026
Why DL2497 runs late
Where US DOT attributed the delay minutes on this flight.
crew, maintenance, boarding and fueling, all within the carrier’s control
weather severe enough to stop this flight specifically
airspace and airport capacity, including weather-driven flow control
the inbound aircraft was late, so this flight started late
Share of the delay minutes US DOT attributed to each cause for DL2497 on SAT → DTW. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering June 2024 – July 2026
Does a late aircraft delay this flight?
How often the plane that flies DL2497 comes in late, and what that does to the departure.
When the aircraft came in 15 or more minutes late, DL2497 pushed back an average of 1 minute early; when it came in on time or early, an average of 4 minutes early.
Each departure is matched to the flight the same aircraft flew into SAT just before it, using the tail number in the DOT file, 745 of 777 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| DL2497 | 23% | 7% | 4% |
| Network, same turn | 33% | 24% | 11% |
The schedule leaves a long gap on the ground, which gives a late aircraft room to catch up before this flight pushes back.
The network row is every flight with a scheduled turn of 3 to 6 hours. How often DL2497’s aircraft landed 15 or more minutes late is lower than the network’s and, once the aircraft was late, how often DL2497 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 June 2024 – July 2026
From pushback to gate
When it leaves SAT late, does that still matter by the time it reaches DTW?
DL2497 pushes back an average of 1.5 minutes early and reaches the gate at DTW an average of 5.6 minutes early. The 4.1 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 13.3 minutes on the taxiways at SAT is about what any departure from the airport in that hour spends.
On arrival at DTW, DL2497 spends 10.6 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 1.2 minutes longer than a typical DTW arrival (9.3 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 DTW. Taxi-out is gate to wheels up and sits inside the scheduled block rather than on top of it; the comparison is 10,664 departures from SAT scheduled in the clock hour DL2497 most often leaves in. Taxi-in is landing to gate, compared against every arrival FlyerIntel has on file at DTW (388,616 flights), not just DL2497’s own. More on taxi time.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · June 2024 – July 2026
The hour it leaves SAT
Part of any flight’s record belongs to the clock rather than to the flight. DL2497 has one departure time, so this is what that time is worth.
On-time arrival rate. 10,664 departures from SAT are scheduled in the 5 AM–6 AM hour over the period, against 127,237 across the whole day.
DL2497 is scheduled out of SAT at 5:15 AM, in the 5 AM–6 AM bank. Departures from SAT in that hour arrive on time 93.5% of the time against 82.3% across the airport’s whole day — the slot alone is worth 11.2 points better before anything about this particular flight is considered.
The two airport figures cover every departure from SAT 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 · June 2024 – July 2026 · Hours below 120 departures are not scored.
Other routes DL2497 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| FLL→LGA Fort Lauderdale to New York | July 1, 2023 – June 6, 2024 | 221 | 71.8% |
| LGA→FLL New York to Fort Lauderdale | July 1, 2023 – June 6, 2024 | 221 | 82.8% |
| RIC→ATL Richmond to Atlanta | April 9, 2024 – May 6, 2024 | 28 | — |
| MSP→MSN Minneapolis to Madison | March 10, 2024 – April 8, 2024 | 30 | — |
| DTW→FLL Detroit to Fort Lauderdale | January 8, 2024 – March 9, 2024 | 62 | — |
| FLL→DTW Fort Lauderdale to Detroit | January 8, 2024 – March 9, 2024 | 62 | — |
Because the same number has served different journeys, the statistics above describe only the route DL2497 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.
5 min late
against a median of 12 min early
Percentiles over 785 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering June 2024 – July 2026
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 785 records of DL2497 operating SAT → DTW, 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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