Tokyo’s Haneda and Narita airports turned in the best on-time performance for departures among the world’s top-50 airports in April, despite operating through the aftermath of the disastrous earthquake and tsunami in March.
The airports’ astonishing performance is reported in the latest figures from US-based analyst FlightStats.
It rated Haneda the best for punctuality among the world’s busiest airports with 94.7% of flights departing on time last month and Narita number three with 87.5%.
London’s Stansted came second with 90.5% of departures on time – that is, departing within 15 minutes of the scheduled time.
Heathrow was number 13 with 83% on time, Gatwick number 17 with 80.3% and Manchester number 41 with a punctuality rate of 62.9%.
Of Heathrow’s rivals on the Continent, Amsterdam came fifth, Frankfurt 15th and Paris Charles de Gaulle 16th in the FlightStats list.
However, British Airways and sister carrier Iberia may be concerned to see Madrid Barajas airport in 38th place with an on-time departure rate of 66% in April and 9% of flights judged to have left “excessively” late. Willie Walsh, head of the merged carrier’s parent company International Airlines Group, has said expansion at Madrid could compensate for restrictions on growth at Heathrow.
Dubai, which is developing rapidly as a global hub, came near the bottom of the FlightStats list at number 45 with almost 44% of its departures judged as late.
China’s airports, often held up as a model for development in the industry, propped up the list with Beijing, Guangzhou and Shanghai in the bottom three positions all with more than half their flights departing late and Beijing seeing only one in three services away on time.