This page explains where PlainFlights' information comes from, how it is produced, and how we handle corrections. We publish it because you should be able to judge for yourself how much to trust what you read here — and hold us to it.

Our source

Every flight figure on PlainFlights — on-time rates, average delays, cancellation and diversion counts, and the breakdown of delay causes — comes from a single official source: the U.S. Department of Transportation Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) On-Time Performance database, the federal record that U.S. airlines are required to file every month. We do not scrape the web, accept user-submitted figures, or estimate values to fill gaps. Where a number is derived (for example, a state's average delay computed from its airports), the calculation is documented in our methodology.

How pages are produced

PlainFlights is a data-journalism site, not a hand-written one. Airline, airport, route, and state pages are generated by a documented data pipeline:

1. Load. We download the BTS On-Time Performance release and parse the monthly carrier, airport, and route records into a structured database. Base counts and times are loaded directly — never edited by hand.
2. Compute. We aggregate the monthly records into airline-, airport-, route-, and state-level profiles and compute derived metrics (on-time rate, average delay when a flight is late, cancellation and diversion rates) using a published, consistent definition.
3. Render. Each page reads those figures live from the database, so what you see reflects the loaded dataset rather than a cached copy of a number typed into an article.
4. Frame. The editorial work is in the framing — the explainers, the plain-language context, the methodology, and the guides. That layer is written and maintained by the PlainFlights editorial team, operating under Kiznis Studio.

We are deliberate about the line between the two: we never alter an underlying flight figure to make a sentence read better, and we label plain-language explanation where it could be mistaken for an official BTS statement.

Sourcing standards

• Flight data is attributed to the BTS On-Time Performance database, with the coverage window shown near the figures and in the sitewide data-sources note.
• Explainers and guides cite primary or authoritative sources for load-bearing claims, with links you can follow.
• We present on-time rate, delay, cancellation, and delay-cause mix as neutral metrics. We do not rate airlines or airports as "good" or "bad," and we do not editorialize a carrier up or down.
• We take no payment, sponsorship, or promoted placement from the airlines or airports we cover. Our only revenue is contextual display advertising, which has no influence on what we cover or how we present it.

Update cadence

The BTS publishes On-Time Performance data monthly, with an inherent lag of a few months between a flight and its appearance in the released dataset. We refresh PlainFlights after each new BTS release and update the coverage window shown on the site when we do. The current dataset and coverage years are stated on our about and methodology pages.

Corrections process

If you believe a figure on PlainFlights is wrong, please tell us. Email hello@plainflights.com (or use the contact form) and include:

• the exact URL of the affected page;
• the specific figure or sentence you believe is wrong;
• what the correct value should be; and
• a link or citation to the official source, where you have one.

Here is what happens next. We trace the figure back to its source field in the BTS data. If the value on PlainFlights does not match the source, that is a defect on our side: we fix it at the data or pipeline level so the correction holds through the next refresh, rather than patching a single page by hand. If the figure on PlainFlights does match the BTS record but the upstream record itself looks wrong, we cannot rewrite the official filing — but we can add a correction note to the page. Either way we will reply to let you know what we found.

Limitations we are upfront about

PlainFlights covers the domestic flights of the U.S. carriers required to report to the BTS, so the smallest carriers and many regional operations are not separately broken out. "On time" follows the federal standard — arrival within 15 minutes of schedule — and cancelled and diverted flights are reported separately and excluded from on-time rates. "Average delay" on airline, airport, route, and state pages is the average among delayed flights, not across all flights. Carrier mergers and code changes can split a single airline's history across two entries. There is a multi-month reporting lag. We say this plainly on the relevant pages rather than burying it. For any decision that matters, verify against the official BTS records.

Who is responsible

PlainFlights is published by Kiznis Studio. The PlainFlights editorial team is accountable for these standards, for the framing and methodology, and for acting on the corrections above. You can reach us any time at hello@plainflights.com.