
The Department of Transportation (DOT) is pursuing airlines over allegations they let down tens of thousands of passengers by operating chronically delayed flights for months on end, but Southwest Airlines is now fighting back over the hefty penalties being pursued by the Feds.
That fight could now land Southwest Airlines in a California district court where attorneys working for the DOT have just filed a $2.1 million lawsuit against the carrier after attempts to reach a consent order ended in failure.
The lawsuit relates to a little-known law that bans airlines from operating flights that consistently arrive late at their destination by 30 minutes or more, regardless of whether the reasons for the delays were under the airline’s control or not.
The rule was little known because aside from sending warning letters, until last year, the DOT had never enforced the law. That all changed in 2024 when the DOT suddenly put a slew of airlines on notice that they were being investigated over the issue.
So far, the DOT has reached consent orders with JetBlue and Frontier Airlines over allegations that they operated chronically delayed flights. Despite a slew of mitigating factors, the two airlines will have to pay a total of $2.65 million in civil penalties.
Frontier and JetBlue disagreed with the DOT’s findings but decided to reach a consent order with the government to settle the matter. Southwest, however, has yet to reach an out-of-court settlement with the DOT, and the airline says it is holding out on a “reasonable settlement.”
As a result, the two sides remain at loggerheads, and that’s resulted in the DOT suing Southwest for two ‘chronically delayed’ flights between Chicago and Oakland and between Baltimore and Cleveland from April to July 2022.
Under the chronically delayed flight regulations, Southwest should have identified the fact that flights were operating late more often than not and then made adjustments to its schedule to prevent “significant harm” to passengers.
The regulations give airlines four months to identify and then change an “unrealistic schedule,” but in Southwest’s case, the DOT claims the airline continued operating these chronically delayed flights on at least 58 occasions.
Each flight represents a violation of the regulations, and each violation carries a maximum penalty of $37,377.
Unsurprisingly, Southwest is less than impressed with the DOT’s litigious approach to resolving the dispute.
“Southwest is disappointed that DOT chose to file a lawsuit over two flights that occurred more than two years ago,” a spokesperson said in an emailed statement.
“Since DOT issued its Chronically Delayed Flight (CDF) policy in 2009, Southwest has operated more than 20 million flights with no other CDF violations. Any claim that these two flights represent an unrealistic schedule is simply not credible when compared with our performance over the past 15 years,” the airline explained.
So far, we know of three airlines that have been accused of chronically delayed flight violations. Don’t be surprised if more airlines are announced soon.
Mateusz Maszczynski honed his skills as an international flight attendant at the most prominent airline in the Middle East and has been flying ever since... most recently for a well known European airline. Matt is passionate about the aviation industry and has become an expert in passenger experience and human-centric stories. Always keeping an ear close to the ground, Matt's industry insights, analysis and news coverage is frequently relied upon by some of the biggest names in journalism.
My son & I have lived all over Texas all our lives, including a few years in Dallas & w/in 15 minutes of Love Field. We LUV Southwest!!! When he was little my father would paint miniatures in the colors of SW, including when their jets sported special paint jobs like an orca whale & a Texas flag. We LUV Southwest! We think it’s hilarious that the feds r suing over delayed flights. Every airline has delays but it isn’t the delay that matters, it’s what the airline -& especially THE PILOTS- do about it. Delays make passengers cranky but only SW leans into it & once the hatch is closed the pilots tell u it’s ‘yeehaw-giddyup-balls to the wall’ they’re gonna do everything they can to get u to your destination ASAP. And the cabin crew leans in, too, often w/ some stupidly funny joke or little tune. Maybe it’s a Texan thing to luv our famously “never on time airline”…..& sadly SW has lost too much of it’s uniqueness & wry charm as we native Texans have become increasingly rare, almost as rare as corporations that care about their customers. But I still luv them & I say STAND FIRM SOUTHWEST! You r the airline of in-flight ukulele lessons & Tammie Jo “I landed this bird” Shultz. Never surrender!