NEW YORK, Oct. 16 -- Through the end of this year, a jet pulled from service for an unscheduled repair will keep being counted as the airline's own doing in federal delay data. The U.S. Department of Transportation said in a notice published Thursday that it is pushing back, from October 19 to February 1, 2027, a rule that would take that kind of delay, and nine others, out of the category reserved for circumstances within a carrier's control.

The reprieve was the industry's request. Airlines for America, the carriers' trade group, asked on September 21 for the later date, according to the notice, saying airlines and the department's statistics bureau need time to update their systems. The department agreed, and says reporting under the ...