North America's top ten performing airlines

North American airlines, on average, delivered 72.60% of their flights to the arrival gate within 15 minutes of schedulein December, down 9.08 percentage points from November's 81.68%.

According to FlightStats, cancelations for the group in December were up sharply: 15,767 canceled flights compared to 9,834 in November 2012. Airlines had to contend with the negative effects from several winter storms during the 2012 holiday travel period.

North America's top ten performing airlines and their on-time percentages in December were:

1.         HA       Hawaiian Airlines - 91.40%
2.         WP       Hawaii Island Air dba Island Air - 86.35%
3.         CM       Copa Airlines - 85.75%
4.         5D        Aerolitoral - 85.68%
5.         QX       Horizon Air - 85.56%
6.         DL        Delta Air Lines - 84.59%
7.         YV       Mesa Airlines - 84.04%
8.         CP       Compass Airlines - 83.55%
9.         US       US Airways - 82.94%
10.       AS       Alaska Airlines - 82.94%

Delta led the majors again in December. Here's how the North American major carriers on-time arrival percentages compared:

1.         DL        Delta Air Lines - 84.59%
2.         US       US Airways - 82.94%
3.         AS       Alaska Airlines - 82.94%
4.         UA       United Airlines - 77.59%
5.         AA       American Airlines - 75.73%
6.         WN       Southwest Airlines - 74.37%
7.         B6        Jetblue Airways - 70.21%
8.         AC       Air Canada - 59.90%

FlightStats on-time performance calculations are based upon data collected from a variety of sources- both primary and secondary. Our coverage of any single airline's flights varies in percentage terms. In some cases, only secondary sources can be obtained that represent a subset of an airline's total flight operations. This is especially true for certain low-cost carriers, notably Easyjet.

Therefore, the calculations represented here should, in general, be considered indicative of an airline's performance but not a definitive measure. We continue to work hard to fill in our coverage gaps. However, reaching 100% coverage will require the cooperation of some airlines that, at present, are unwilling to participate