WE’RE STILL WAITING

REVEALED Our airports trail nation in delays

HOBART’S airport is the worst in the nation when it comes to ontime performance — with more than one in four of the flights out being delayed.

The latest Federal Government data shows Hobart is doing worse than every one of the other 39 airports in the country in terms of ontime arrivals and departures. The second-worst in April was the Sunshine Coast, followed by Launceston.

Tasmania’s Tourism Council boss Luke Martin said: “This is one tourism leaderboard we would prefer not to top.”

The latest data from the Bureau of Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Economics shows one in every four flights into and out of Hobart was delayed in April, with an average of just 74.8 per cent running on-time.

Departures were worse than arrivals, with just 69.9 per cent on time during the month — compared with 79.7 per cent of arrivals.

The second-worst airport — with an average of 75.1 per cent on-time performance — was the Sunshine Coast, the nation’s 14th biggest airport.

Third-worst was Launceston (77.2 per cent), followed by Melbourne (77.6 per cent), Mildura (77.8 per cent) and Ballina (79.3 per cent).

Mr Martin said mainland delays were partly responsible for services running behind schedule.

“No one likes flights delays, least of all the airlines, because it costs them money and their reputation, so I’m sure they’re working on this with urgency.

“Hobart being at the end of the network means we’re always the most affected by delays in the larger cities.”

The April fail came after a few solid months of on-time performance for Hobart, which is also recording nationleading growth in passenger numbers.

It had a 5.6 per cent rise to 2.51 million passengers passing through the airport in 2017.

Last year, the government data showed Hobart was second to the Sunshine Coast in terms of worst performance.

Tigerair Australia was the worst performer (56.5 per cent) locally, followed by Jetstar (65.7), Virgin Airlines (67.6) Qantas (80.9) and QantasLink (92.5).

A Hobart Airport spokesman said a late flight arrival inevitably delayed the outbound flight. “We are working closely with the airlines to reduce delays for the travelling public and are confident improvements have been made.”