China’s airports and airlines lead the world in flight delays: US survey
Mainland facilities and carriers lag far behind the international competition as management fails to keep up with the demand for travel
Chinese airports and airlines were the worst in the world for being on time last year, according to a US-based company that tracks air travel around the globe.
Among the world's 61 largest airports, the seven worst performers for on-time departures were all mainland airports, with Hangzhou's Xiaoshan, Shanghai's Hongqiao and Shanghai's Pudong facilities taking the bottom three spots, according to FlightStats, a US-based data provider on air travel.
Just 37.74 per cent of flights left on time from Xiaoshan, 37.17 per cent from Hongqiao and 37.26 per cent from Pudong.
Those three were closely followed in the survey by Shenzhen Baoan, Guangzhou Baiyun, Chongqing Airport and Beijing Capital International Airport.
Out of the world's largest 61 airports, Japan's Haneda Airport was the best with an on-time rate of 89.76 per cent. The best performer among the 374 world airports of all sizes looked at by FlightStats was another Japanese airport, Itami, with an on-time rate of 94.56 per cent.
Zou Jianjun, from the Civil Aviation Management Institute of China, said management of China's facilities had not kept up with demand and the network was concentrated in a few areas.