Route profile
PIT→DCA
Flight reliability, delays and best times to fly from Pittsburgh to Washington, 204 miles.
Right now
Aviation weather is not currently a factor.
Aviation weather is not currently a factor.
Route reliability
July 2023 – July 2026
Better than 32% of comparable major US routes (4,598 compared)
Calculated from 4,877 flights. How this is calculated
PIT → DCA arrives on time 78.1% of the time; the return trip, DCA → PIT, arrives on time 78.9% of the time.
PIT → DCA spends 28.9 minutes on the ground on a 204-mile trip: 20.5 minutes from pushback to wheels-up at PIT and 8.4 minutes from touchdown to gate at DCA.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
What stands out
Reliability on this route has fallen unusually sharply over the past year, a bigger swing than 95% of 5,368 comparable routes.
67.9% on time over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), against 79.6% in the 12 months before (2024-08 to 2025-07), a change of 11.7 points.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026 · Ranked against every other route with the same kind of figure and at least 5,368 in the comparison.
Why PIT → DCA flights are cancelled
July 2023 – July 2026
PIT → DCA cancelled 119 of 4,877 scheduled flights — about 1 in every 41. The reason filed most often was extreme weather, 65.5% of the cancellations coded on this route — about 1 in every 63 scheduled flights.
Share of cancellations
Of 119 cancelled departures carrying a reason code.
What each reason means
Conditions the carrier judged severe enough to stop the flight: a blizzard, a hurricane, a line of thunderstorms.
78 cancellations, 65.5% of the total.
Airport capacity, air traffic control flow programs, heavy traffic and ordinary bad weather. A system decision, not the airline’s.
21 cancellations, 17.6% of the total.
Crew, maintenance, aircraft cleaning, baggage or fueling: what BTS counts as within the carrier’s own control.
20 cancellations, 16.8% of the total.
A terminal evacuation, a security breach, screening equipment failure, or screening queues over 29 minutes.
0 cancellations, 0.0% of the total.
Reason codes are the operating airline’s own filing with US DOT, not an independent finding of fault. Ordinary bad weather is filed under air traffic, so weather’s full share is larger than its bar.
119 coded cancellations were recorded on PIT → DCA; the section appears from 50.
When it goes wrong
July 2023 – July 2026
45 min late
against a median of 7 min early
Percentiles over 4,877 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Will your connection be tight enough?
Layovers at DCA after arriving from PIT.
| Connection time | Chance of missing | Reads as |
|---|---|---|
| 30 min | 37% | Likely to miss |
| 45 min | 21% | High risk |
| 60 min | 13% | Some risk |
| 90 min | 7.4% | Some risk |
| 120 min | 4.4% | Low risk |
This is one leg of a connection. Gate changes and the next flight's own schedule matter too. And a connection can fail before delay is even the question — this route cancels 2.44% of the time and diverts 0.08% of the time, which a late arrival never shows up in.
Chance of missing is the share of 4,754 arrivals on this route that landed later than the connection time less 30 minutes to reach the next gate.
The worst tenth of arrivals on this route land at least 45 minutes late (90th-percentile gate arrival delay), over 4,877 operations.
Any other layover length: connection checker.
Best time to fly
PIT → DCA flights departing 5–9 AM arrived on time 85.5% of the time, against 62.7% for 6–9 PM departures, a gap of 22.8 percentage points.
By departure window
By departure hour
- 12 AM to 4 AM: too few flights to score
- 5 AM: 95.8% on time from 342 flights
- 6 AM: 91.8% on time from 482 flights
- 7 AM: 77.5% on time from 132 flights
- 8 AM: 72.8% on time from 440 flights
- 9 AM: 87.6% on time from 269 flights
- 10 AM: 81.9% on time from 592 flights
- 11 AM: 80.9% on time from 292 flights
- 12 PM: 75.8% on time from 412 flights
- 1 PM: 78.4% on time from 596 flights
- 2 PM: 69.9% on time from 133 flights
- 3 PM: 73.9% on time from 216 flights
- 4 PM: too few flights to score
- 5 PM: 65.7% on time from 212 flights
- 6 PM: 56.1% on time from 172 flights
- 7 PM: 71.5% on time from 424 flights
- 8 PM to 11 PM: too few flights to score
Why PIT → DCA runs late
July 2023 – July 2026
the inbound aircraft was late, so this flight started late
airspace and airport capacity, including weather-driven flow control
crew, maintenance, boarding and fueling, all within the carrier’s control
weather severe enough to stop this flight specifically
screening or terminal security incidents
Share of the delay minutes US DOT attributed to each cause for PIT → DCA. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed.
Late-arriving aircraft is the largest cause on PIT → DCA, at 43.9%: flights here mostly leave late because the plane came in late, and the day shows it: 5–9 AM departures arrived on time 85.5% of the time and 6–9 PM departures 62.7%.
Airlines on this route
Carriers with at least 200 flights, by the airline that operated each one.
| Carrier | Flights | On time | Cancelled | Median delay | Severe |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airways | 2,356 | 85.0% | 1.36% | -9 min | 3.8% |
| PSA Airlines | 1,453 | 73.1% | 4.34% | -7 min | 10.4% |
| Envoy Air | 544 | 71.4% | 1.65% | -3 min | 8.8% |
| American Airlines | 524 | 67.6% | 2.86% | -2 min | 14.9% |
Republic Airways flew 48.3% of the 4,877 flights listed. PSA Airlines cancelled 4.34% of its flights here against 1.36% for Republic Airways.
Republic Airways arrived on time 17.4 percentage points more often than American Airlines on this route.
Weekly and seasonal patterns
By day of week
Saturday is historically the most reliable day and Thursday the least, a gap of 8.8 percentage points.
By month
- Jan: 73.2%
- Feb: 69.4%
- Mar: 74.4%
- Apr: 78.4%
- May: 80.3%
- Jun: 76.9%
- Jul: 75.6%
- Aug: 80.5%
- Sep: 86.9%
- Oct: 85.0%
- Nov: 78.5%
- Dec: 75.9%
February is historically the weakest month and September the strongest, a spread of 17.5 percentage points.
Reliability over time
July 2023 – July 2026
- July 2023: 75.0% from 173 flights
- August 2023: 86.7% from 176 flights
- September 2023: 85.5% from 161 flights
- October 2023: 91.9% from 173 flights
- November 2023: 90.8% from 142 flights
- December 2023: 87.5% from 120 flights
- January 2024: 80.3% from 135 flights
- February 2024: 89.3% from 140 flights
- March 2024: 87.2% from 148 flights
- April 2024: 79.6% from 142 flights
- May 2024: 79.3% from 124 flights
- June 2024: too few flights to score (114)
- July 2024: 75.4% from 120 flights
- August 2024: too few flights to score (115)
- September 2024: 86.6% from 134 flights
- October 2024: 88.0% from 142 flights
- November 2024: 85.3% from 136 flights
- December 2024: 76.2% from 124 flights
- January 2025: 72.5% from 136 flights
- February 2025: 61.2% from 129 flights
- March 2025: 78.1% from 140 flights
- April 2025: 85.5% from 145 flights
- May 2025: 86.0% from 146 flights
- June 2025: too few flights to score (116)
- July 2025: too few flights to score (115)
- August 2025: 76.0% from 132 flights
- September 2025: too few flights to score (118)
- October 2025: 73.2% from 139 flights
- November 2025: too few flights to score (114)
- December 2025: too few flights to score (104)
- January 2026: too few flights to score (118)
- February 2026: too few flights to score (109)
- March 2026: too few flights to score (118)
- April 2026: too few flights to score (113)
- May 2026: 74.6% from 122 flights
- June 2026: 73.2% from 129 flights
- July 2026: too few flights to score (115)
Over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), on-time arrivals averaged 67.9% against 79.6% in the 12 months before — declining by 11.7 percentage points.
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 4,877 PIT → DCA flight records from the US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, covering July 2023 – July 2026. Late means 15 or more minutes past scheduled arrival; cancelled and diverted flights are left out of on-time rates.
Full methodology · Data sources · Report a problem
Related research: How Long a Layover Needs to Be · Two Airlines on One Route · Best Time of Day to Fly From Major US Airports
Analysis last recomputed