Operational issues: only one ground crew at JFK, etc.
 

Our flight into JFK was scheduled to land at 12:28am. We were on the ground at about 12:10, but sat waiting for a gate until 12:46 (arrival according to DL, the door opened about 5 minutes later by my watch). The captain said there was only one ground crew at JFK. Can that be true?

An earlier flight out of FAT departed about 30 minutes late because the incoming flight sat at a gate for 30 minutes until they figured out the gate didn't work and switched gates. Maybe that was the airport's fault.

Finally, I got a message on my home phone that our flight out of FAT, for which we had F seats, would be on an all coach flight and asking me to call if I wanted another flight. It had been scheduled on a CR7 and ended up on an E175, which has F. DL should have known I was not at home, since they had flown us to FAT, and therefore should have called on my mobile. Maybe I should be happy they didn't reach me.

What happened to operational efficiency?

This is no longer a hallmark of Delta as it may have been ~2+ years ago.

Is it a distinguishing feature of any US airline?

Certainly not any of the major ones. I think AS gets pretty decent on time results but I really never fly them so I’m not really sure.

Hmm, this isn’t really year to date information and conveniently misses most of Delta’s major holiday meltdowns including Easter, Christmas/New Years, and Thanksgiving.

Hawaiian usually places first... because of the remarkably calm and consistent weather they are flying out of. :)

Ground staff is all outsourced to Swissport at JFK right?

Or does DL have their own in-house ground staff fir JFK?

All staffing in JFK is mainline Delta.

Did Delta call the number you have listed as primary?

A global pandemic?

Whereby traffic was also down 80% and in most instances at other airlines things ran far more smoothly than usual. This is nothing more than a staffing issue and staffing is something that Delta has managed worse than most of its peers throughout the last ~14 months.

We will have to agree to disagree about things running far more smoothly than usual at other airlines.

Possibly, it really depends on what your experience has been flying in the preceding year. Operationally though, with far fewer passengers, I found it to be a treat flying from March 2020-March 2021. Quiet TSA lines, emptier flights, far fewer ATC delays, flights board and deplane quickly. Really the only noteworthy operational failures of the last year have centered around Delta's inability to staff its airline adequately.

From a product point of view, I'd agree things have been a disaster across most domestic airlines with JetBlue leading the pack and AA being a standard deviation behind. It seems like United is getting ready to be the leader for a bit now though.

No. Phone 1 is mobile/cell, phone 2 is home. They called 2.