SITA launches early-warning API to help airports and airlines manage flight delays sooner
February 11, 2026
Aviation technology provider SITA has introduced a new alerting tool designed to give airlines and airports earlier visibility of potential flight delays—before disruption cascades across networks.
Airlines and passengers lose billions due to delayed information
In the past decade alone, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) estimates that air traffic flow delays in Europe have cost airlines and passengers €16.1 billion. Many of these costs are not attributable to actual delays, but to the lack of timely information that would allow airlines and airports to adjust plans, reallocate resources, and protect onward schedules before disruption spreads.
Arrival airports often learn about inbound delays too late to respond efficiently. When disruption is detected only after schedules slip, ground crews may wait unnecessarily, gates can remain blocked, crew duty may exceed time limits, and passengers risk missing onward connections, resulting in avoidable added costs and reputational damage.
SITA’s Advance Flight Delay Notification API aims to close that information gap.
Predicting flight disruption before arrival
The Advance Flight Delay Notification API combines the most recent departure-side operational data with business logic based on expected flight duration to anticipate potential delays. It then automatically notifies destination airports, delivering:
- Automated early warnings for delayed or potentially disrupted inbound flights
- Real-time status updates pushed directly to arrival-airport stakeholders
- Centralised alerts to support coordinated decision-making across ground handlers, aircraft service teams and onward crews.
By providing earlier situational awareness, the system allows airline and airport operational teams to adjust gate allocation, crew planning, turnaround sequencing, and passenger connections to avoid flight disruption spreading across the network.
“Most disruption isn’t caused by the delay itself, but by how late it becomes visible to the teams expected to manage it,” said Martin Smillie, senior vice president for communications and data exchange at SITA. “Across the industry, arrival airports are still forced to react rather than intervene. Advance Flight Delay Notification API shifts that model by giving earlier, reliable signals, so operational decisions are made with time, not under pressure.”
Automated alerts and secure delivery
The solution distributes centralised push notifications to stakeholders via secure, encrypted HTTP connections, eliminating the need for repeated manual schedule checks or ad hoc updates.
According to the details provided in the API’s documentation:
- The API pushes information on departure delays to the corresponding arrival airport as soon as it becomes available.
- A flight is considered delayed when it is 15 minutes past its scheduled departure time and no departure status has been sent.
- Once a delayed flight has departed, the API sends a notification to the subscribed arrival airport.
Passengers also benefit indirectly from the system. Automated alerts, triggered when a flight will depart 15 minutes later than scheduled, give airport and airline teams time to adjust boarding, servicing, and onward travel arrangements.
Real-time data sharing to improve operational efficiency
SITA offers the Advance Flight Delay Notification API as a subscription service. It forms part of SITA’s wider flight-information API portfolio, which enables secure, real-time data exchange between partners across the air-transport ecosystem.
As airlines pursue tighter schedules and higher aircraft utilisation, earlier visibility into disruptions supports operational efficiency, ensures a positive passenger experience, and helps control costs.
With constrained airline capacity and rising air travel demand, having accurate flight information on time can matter as much as the flight’s original timing.
Featured Image: ID_Anuphon | stock.adobe.com
