Flight Bumping Less Likely

You’re now less likely to be bumped off your flight than at any point in the last 22 years — a stat that we’re sure has nothing to do with the David Dao incident on a United flight four months ago.

Let’s review that in case we forgot what it looks like when an airline throws a seated passenger off his flight in favor of staff:

According to the Air Travel Consumer report, “fewer than one passenger out of 1000” was involuntarily bumped off a flight during the first six months of the year. Note that the Dao incident occurred in early April — approximately midway through the period analyzed. So perhaps airlines were trending in the right direction anyway — or perhaps a post-Dao adjustment radically shifted figures.

That’s good new for flyers, and it doesn’t stop there, with 76 percent of flights landing on time — the best-performing three airlines were perpetual top-placer Hawaiian, Alaskan (soon to absorb Virgin America), and Delta.

Meet your guide

Diane Rommel

Diane Rommel has written for The Wall Street Journal, Outside, Marie Claire, Cosmopolitan, Travel + Leisure, Wallpaper and Afar, as well as The Cut, Buzzfeed, Huffington Post and McSweeney’s. She once drove from London to Mongolia, via Siberia.