Sioux City and Statewide, Iowa – New research has identified the U.S. airports with the longest delays.
The study by student travel company Rustic Pathways analyzed data from the Bureau of Transportation Statistics on arriving flight punctuality between May 2024 and May 2025, the latest data available, to reveal which airports had the longest delays per arriving flight on average. In this case, the delay in minutes is the difference between the scheduled arrival time and the actual arrival time.
Three Iowa airports were found to have significant average arriving flight delays between May 2024 and May 2025: Sioux Gateway Airport (SUX) ranked 12th with an average delay of 27.46 minutes, Waterloo Regional Airport (ALO) ranked 35th with an average delay of 20.06 minutes and Mason City Municipal Airport ranked 45th with an average delay of 19.54 minutes.
The highest ranked airport with the most delays was Lea County Regional Airport (HOB) in New Mexico. St. Cloud Regional Airport (STC) in Minnesota saw the shortest flight delays at one minute and 46 seconds.
