Flight Delays Screensaver
The Flight Delays screensaver is a live operations board of delays and ground stops at major U.S. airports — who's running late and why — from the FAA's national airspace status, gathered by the pipeline. It's free, runs in your browser, and ESC exits.
How the Flight Delays screensaver works
A background pipeline reads the FAA's national airspace status — the live picture of delays, ground stops and closures across U.S. airports.
The saver lays it out as an operations board: each affected airport with its status, the average delay and the reason.
Ground stops and closures are flagged red, general delays amber, with the worst sorted to the top.
When the skies are clear it simply reports no major delays, and it refreshes every couple of minutes.
A worked example
On a stormy afternoon the board lights up — BOS · Ground Delay · 48 min · low ceilings, DCA · Ground Stop · weather — while a calm day reads a quiet ✓ No major delays reported.
Settings & tips
- Accent recolours the board headings.
- Background sets the board backdrop.
- Run
automation/run.py delayson your pipeline machine to refresh the status.
Frequently asked questions
- Is the status real?
- Yes. It comes from the FAA's national airspace status, refreshed by the pipeline, so the delays and ground stops are the official ones.
- Why is the board sometimes empty?
- When no major airports are reporting delays the board says so — clear-weather days simply have little to show.
- Why does it use a pipeline?
- The FAA status feed isn't readable directly from a browser, so a small background script fetches it and saves a snapshot.
- Does it cover the whole world?
- No. The FAA covers United States airports, so the board is U.S.-focused.
- Is it free?
- Yes — free, no download, in your browser.