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What are the best and worst airlines at handling wheelchairs?

Spirit Airlines is 12 times more likely to mishandle wheelchairs than baggage.

by USAFacts Team

Every day in the US, approximately 2,000 people who use wheelchairs or other mobility aids board a plane. Federal regulations don’t allow passengers to remain in their custom mobility aid during flights, so they must take a seat while their mobility aid is stored elsewhere.

Mobility aids that are small enough to be stored in the overhead bins or other designated areas can be kept in the cabin. Those that are too large are transported in the cargo hold.

In March 2023, one in every 65 mobility aids loaded onto airplane cargo holds were mishandled — either lost, damaged, or delayed — during transport. That’s nearly 900 people whose mobility aids were not returned in their expected condition in a single month. In comparison, one in 175 checked bags were reported as mishandled.

Some airlines have a worse track record than the rest. Spirit Airlines mishandled approximately one out of 16 mobility aids, and JetBlue mishandled around one in 22. This is 12 and 7 times more frequent than the rates at which these airlines mishandled bags, respectively.

Wheelchairs are mishandled on airlines twice as often as checked baggage

March 2023

Note: “Wheelchair” refers to mobility aids such as manual and motorized wheelchairs and motorized scooters.

“Mishandled” refers to bags or mobility aids that were either lost, delayed, damaged, or pilfered while in the airline’s custody. These reports were submitted either by or on behalf of the customer.

Get the data

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services considers mobility aids to be medical devices. They can cost tens of thousands of dollars.

Illinois Senator Tammy Duckworth, a wheelchair user herself, likens damaging or losing a mobility device during travel to breaking the legs of passengers. She describes the experience as “a complete loss of mobility and independence.”

Have airlines gotten better at handling wheelchairs and scooters?

The Department of Transportation has required large airlines[1] to report the total number of checked bags, wheelchairs, and scooters that were lost, damaged, or otherwise mishandled monthly since December 2018.

The percentage of mobility aids that were mishandled has remained largely unchanged — between 1 and 2% — over the past four years. Certain airlines, however, report an increasing proportion of damaged wheelchairs each month.

Collectively, airlines mishandled less than 2% of wheelchairs since 2019, but some airlines mishandled more in 2023 than they have in the past

Data shows 3-month moving average of the percentage of wheelchairs mishandled.

Note: “Wheelchair” refers to mobility aids such as manual and motorized wheelchairs and motorized scooters.

“Mishandled” refers to mobility aids that were either lost, delayed, damaged, or pilfered while in the airline’s custody. These reports were submitted either by or on behalf of the customer.

Get the data

American Airlines and its subsidiaries, Envoy and PSA, had fewer reports of mishandled mobility aids in early 2023 than in 2019. Notably, damages for all three airlines dropped in mid-2019 and have not returned to their initial high levels. That said, all three airlines still mishandle wheelchairs at a higher rate than airlines as a whole.

Spirit and JetBlue Airlines are reporting more frequent mishandling of mobility aids, showing increases since early 2020 and early 2021, respectively.

The percentage of mishandled mobility aids for some airlines dropped in early 2020 when the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic limited the number of available flights. However, reported mishandling returned back to pre-pandemic levels within a few months.

How is the government addressing airline wheelchair mishandling?

Federal regulations require airlines to properly train their staff and contractors to work with passengers with disabilities and their assistive devices.

Members of the executive and legislative branches have recently proposed further guidance and regulations. In a March 2022 public meeting hosted by the Transportation Department, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said the department would soon “[work] on a new rulemaking that would make damaging or delaying wheelchairs a violation subject to fines, improve training for airline employees that handle wheelchairs, and do a lot more.”

The department has since published an Airline Passenger with Disabilities Bill of Rights. The document provides summarized versions of existing laws to “empower travelers to understand their rights and help the travel industry uphold those rights.”

In May 2023, Senators Duckworth and John Thune and Representatives Steve Cohen and Pete Stauber introduced bipartisan, bicameral legislation that would require airlines to report on the frequency and severity of damage caused to mobility aids.

The legislation would also require the Transportation Department to provide Congress with a plan on how to research the technical and financial feasibility of allowing passengers to remain in their mobility aid during a flight.

Sources & Footnotes

  1. [1]

    All US airlines with at least half of one percent of total domestic scheduled-service passenger revenue are required to report to the Department of Transportation.