kolsky

I was supposed to fly out of Copenhagen to Amsterdam on KL 1132 leaving 5:30 in the afternoon of April 22nd.

Flightstats.com (and other apps feeding from the same source, probably) showed the flight as cancelled. The flight was NOT cancelled. Fortunately I called Delta and the checked with the internal KLM system.

Lesson - do not trust ANY of the information in flightstats.com.

star_world

This sounds like a problem with KL more than anything else. What did their own website say?

ScottC

Flightstats can be trusted - whoever provides their data is the one that screwed up. I doubt Flightstats makes up data, so perhaps it was KL that issued the canceled message to their systems. They wouldn't be the first airline with a useless IT infrastructure.

docbert

Over the past few days there's been a number of instances of similar things on multiple airlines.

If you check, you'll probably find that the flight you finally flew on had a different flight number to the one you were supposed to fly on - even though it might have left at around the same time. ie, technically your original flight probably was canceled, but you were moved to another flight.

Airlines have been using things like this to try and play catch-up since Europe flights have started flying again.

OverThereTooMuch

Wow, one piece of bad info and they "can't be trusted".

With that sort of attitude, you probably don't have any friends, and TV weathermen must drive you insane!

kolsky

Lets answer all the comments in one fell swoop:
1. The flight left under the original flight number on the same time - I have the boarding pass to prove it.
2. Copenhagen airport's departures and AMS arrivals posted the correct information about the flight.
3. KLM had the correct information. I talked to the Delta rep and she contacted the internal KLM system and verified that the flight, per KLM, with its original flight number and equipment is on time.
4. When a web site (and flightstats was not the only one, TripCase sent me an email telling me the flight was canceled) tells you that a flight that you're supposed to take is CANCELED. How can you ever trust their sources again? Do I need to check EVERYTHING the post now? This was not an airline problem, it was not an airport problem. I also agree that it was not flightstats/tripcase problem. But since these sites post the info - they can not be trusted.

I shudder to think what would have happened was I to take their misinformation at face value!

kolsky

You just won 'The Most Inane Reply To A Post' award, congratulations!

Comparing the weather to flight information.

kolsky

It said the flight was ON

sbm12

It is entirely possible that the airline posted the flight as canceled at one point and then reinstated it. That would probably be enough for the monitoring sites to issue the canceled notification. The website aren't making up the data themselves; they get it from 3rd party feeds and then they display it in a "pretty" way to the customer. Should you put full faith in information provided by a 3rd party source? I know I never would. Choosing to get alerts from the 3rd party rather than the aircraft operator exposes you to the chance that they'll be wrong.

panamamike

I used flightstat about a year ago with good success. More recently, I used it to track status of my delayed flights and yesterday for when I arrived earlier than normal for a flight.

Turns out flightstats let me down in both cases. It didn't keep info. up to the minute, such as details on flight time/gate changes. I figured maybe the system was slow, but flightstat was wrong all the way up until boarding time. I knew by looking at the airport boards before flightstat had the info.

Could it be the airline system is purposefully slowing down availability of flight info. on the internet? Or is this a site specific problem? If so, what are the alternatives?

I need a WAP or mobile solution.

Mike

MisterNice

Its best to use the airlines website or their telephone CSR. Data from other sources is often never as current.

Sorry OP I concur with the weather analogy.

MisterNice

mikew99

You should never take any single source of information at face value; no source is 100% correct 100% of the time. Heck, I have been given incorrect and out-of-date info directly from an airline's own personnel!

Out of curiosity, what would you do differently if you did assume the flight was cancelled? Wouldn't you just call the airline anyway?

garethmorgan

I turned up in Singapore yesterday for a SQ flight that Tripit Pro said, as it had for the previous couple of weeks, was 'As scheduled' but that didn't actually exist. Do they use Flightstats?

bankops

Automated sites sometimes have issues like this. I frequently had a flight to VIE that showed canceled. The reason being, the flight number for a flight to Strasbourg was being re-used and since the Strasbourg flight was no longer being flown, every day that quarter, my flight to VIE would show up as canceled. Needless to say, it wasn't.

Websites are good for supplemental flight information, but nothing beats talking to the airline or airport itself.

panamamike

Are there other online options that might be more up to date?

Mike