Route profile
RSW→DCA
Flight reliability, delays and best times to fly from Fort Myers to Washington, 892 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 6% of comparable major US routes (4,598 compared)
Calculated from 2,623 flights. How this is calculated · What counts as on time
RSW → DCA arrives on time 73.5% of the time; the return trip, DCA → RSW, arrives on time 77.3% of the time, a 3.8-point gap between the two directions of the same city pair.
RSW → DCA spends 23.1 minutes on the ground on an 892-mile trip: 16.6 minutes from pushback to wheels-up at RSW and 6.5 minutes from touchdown to gate at DCA.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
What stands out
Every airline on this route performs about the same, a narrower carrier gap than 100% of 2,692 comparable routes.
JetBlue (74.4% on time) and American Airlines (74.3%) are close together here.
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 2,692 in the comparison.
What sets this route apart
Where RSW to DCA differs most from similar routes by hour, weekday, month and airline, July 2023 – July 2026.
RSW to DCA struggles most at 12 PM: 68.6% of its flights scheduled then arrive on time, 10.7 points behind the 79.3% on routes of similar length at the same hour. Against all other routes the gap is 10.8 points.
RSW to DCA is at its best against routes of similar length for flights scheduled at 3 PM: 78.8% arrive on time, 7.9 points ahead of the 70.9% those routes manage at that hour.
Friday is the day RSW to DCA slips furthest against routes of similar length, 67.4% on time where they average 75.9%, 8.5 points lower. Against all other routes the gap is 8.8 points.
In March, RSW to DCA runs 11.6 points below routes of similar length, 65.3% on time to 76.9%. Against all other routes the gap is 12.6 points.
RSW to DCA against comparable routes
July 2023 – July 2026| Measure | This route | Compared with | Them | Gap | Flights behind it |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hour: 12 PM departures | 68.6% | routes of similar length | 79.3% | −10.7 pts | 140 here, 166,959 there |
| Hour: 3 PM departures | 78.8% | routes of similar length | 70.9% | +7.9 pts | 146 here, 170,335 there |
| Weekday: Friday | 67.4% | routes of similar length | 75.9% | −8.5 pts | 362 here, 429,235 there |
| Month: March | 65.3% | routes of similar length | 76.9% | −11.6 pts | 277 here, 246,852 there |
Each comparison pools the flights of other routes, with this route’s own left out. Similar length means within 15% of this route’s 892 miles, with at least 5 such routes. A bucket is set against the most comparable group that has enough flights: similar length, then the same origin (at least 3 routes), then all other routes. Hours, weekdays and months appear only where both sides have 120 completed flights, and airlines where both have 600. The gap must be at least 2 points and 2 standard errors, and only the largest gap each way is kept per measure. These are differences in the flights counted, not causes.
Why RSW → DCA flights are cancelled
July 2023 – July 2026
RSW → DCA cancelled 73 of 2,623 scheduled flights — about 1 in every 36. The reason filed most often was extreme weather, 63.0% of the cancellations coded on this route — about 1 in every 57 scheduled flights.
Share of cancellations
Of 73 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.
46 cancellations, 63.0% of the total.
Crew, maintenance, aircraft cleaning, baggage or fueling: what BTS counts as within the carrier’s own control.
15 cancellations, 20.5% of the total.
Airport capacity, air traffic control flow programs, heavy traffic and ordinary bad weather. A system decision, not the airline’s.
12 cancellations, 16.4% 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. With only one or two carriers on the route, the split mostly reflects how they file. Ordinary bad weather is filed under air traffic, so weather’s full share is larger than its bar.
73 coded cancellations were recorded on RSW → DCA; the section appears from 50.
When it goes wrong
July 2023 – July 2026
67 min late
against a median of 5 min early
RSW → DCA has an average that understates its risk: a typical arrival is 5 min early, but the worst tenth are 72 minutes worse than that. If the trip has something unmissable at the end of it, the median is the wrong number to plan against.
Percentiles over 2,623 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Will your connection be tight enough?
Layovers at DCA after arriving from RSW.
| Connection time | Chance of missing | Reads as |
|---|---|---|
| 30 min | 40% | Likely to miss |
| 45 min | 26% | High risk |
| 60 min | 19% | High risk |
| 90 min | 11% | Some risk |
| 120 min | 7.0% | Some 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 2.78% of the time and diverts 0.69% of the time, which a late arrival never shows up in.
Chance of missing is the share of 2,532 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 67 minutes late (90th-percentile gate arrival delay), over 2,623 operations.
Any other layover length: connection checker.
Best time to fly
RSW → DCA flights departing 9 AM–12 PM arrived on time 81.8% of the time, against 62.0% for 6–9 PM departures, a gap of 19.8 percentage points.
By departure window
By departure hour
- 12 AM to 9 AM: too few flights to score
- 10 AM: 88.8% on time from 236 flights
- 11 AM: 79.1% on time from 815 flights
- 12 PM: 68.6% on time from 141 flights
- 1 PM: 68.9% on time from 308 flights
- 2 PM: 70.2% on time from 156 flights
- 3 PM: 78.8% on time from 151 flights
- 4 PM to 5 PM: too few flights to score
- 6 PM: 60.9% on time from 467 flights
- 7 PM: 65.4% on time from 137 flights
- 8 PM to 11 PM: too few flights to score
Why RSW → DCA runs late
July 2023 – July 2026
the inbound aircraft was late, so this flight started late
crew, maintenance, boarding and fueling, all within the carrier’s control
airspace and airport capacity, including weather-driven flow 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 RSW → DCA. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed. What the five causes mean
Late-arriving aircraft is the largest cause on RSW → DCA, at 53.4%: flights here mostly leave late because the plane came in late, and the day shows it: 9 AM–12 PM departures arrived on time 81.8% of the time and 6–9 PM departures 62.0%.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlines | 1,733 | 74.3% | 2.19% | -4 min | 11.3% |
| JetBlue | 435 | 74.4% | 3.45% | -13 min | 10.0% |
American Airlines flew 79.9% of the 2,168 flights listed. JetBlue cancelled 3.45% of its flights here against 2.19% for American Airlines.
Carriers on this route performed within a couple of percentage points of each other.
Weekly and seasonal patterns
By day of week
Tuesday is historically the most reliable day and Friday the least, a gap of 10.5 percentage points.
By month
- Jan: 74.6%
- Feb: 71.6%
- Mar: 65.3%
- Apr: 81.6%
- May: 76.9%
- Jun: 73.0%
- Jul: 61.0%
- Aug: 66.5%
- Sep: 78.5%
- Oct: 79.2%
- Nov: 82.5%
- Dec: 74.8%
July is historically the weakest month and November the strongest, a spread of 21.5 percentage points.
Reliability over time
July 2023 – July 2026
Over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), on-time arrivals averaged 72.0% against 74.4% in the 12 months before — declining by 2.4 percentage points.
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 2,623 RSW → 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