Aspen/Pitkin County Airport sees ‘rare’ rates after rough summer

Aspen saw smooth airport operations in September and October, shifting away from a turbulent summer. 

Following a June, July, and August that saw lower relative flight completion, or the rate that planes completed a flight to or from Aspen when scheduled, the Aspen/Pitkin County Airport has seen a well-operated fall. Officials chalked this up to good weather and an adjustment to recent wind-reporting regulations. 

October saw a completion rate of 100%, 0.4% higher than the same month last year, according to data provided by Bill Tomcich, consultant with Fly Aspen Snowmass and managing partner at Air Planners Inc.

“The fact that October had (a) 100% completion rate, that’s very rare,” Tomcich said. “That happens at most maybe once a year at the Aspen Airport.”

September’s completion rate of 99.8% was 0.2% higher than the same month last year, compared to this year’s June, July, and August monthly average completion rate of 94.4%, which was more than 3% lower than the 97.5% average for the same months over the four preceding years.

The airport saw a lower completion rate during the summer period due to a combination of high winds and a new regulation requiring Aspen’s Federal Aviation Administration control tower to report average wind speed, rather than instantaneous wind speed as they did in the past, according to The Aspen Times’ previous reporting.

That change was instituted after a plane overran the end of the runway during a high tailwind in 2022, when “the flight crew … initiated the takeoff based on an unsolicited instantaneous wind report from the ASE ATC tower controller,” according to a 2024 National Transportation Safety Board investigation.

The new, average wind speed reporting policy requires pilots to wait for an average wind speed measurement showing favorable wind conditions over a period of time, rather than an instantaneous measurement. Over the summer, the transition coincided with high winds and fewer completions. 

But that changed in September and October, according to Tomcich.

“The fact that we had generally quiet weather, for the most part, helped,” Tomcich said. “Along with the fact that, it’s just that much more experience in operating with the new wind reporting, within the parameters of the new wind report.”

Though total passenger numbers in June, July, and August were lower compared to 2024, which Tomcich attributed to the lower flight completion, the overall June through October timespan nearly equalled last year, falling just 0.16% behind.

While 2024’s June through October period saw 301,080 passengers flying in and out of the Aspen/Pitkin County Airport, the five-month period this year saw 300,595, the first and second highest count, respectively, in the airport’s history. 2025’s Year to Date passenger count is so far outpacing last year over the same period, with 627,152 passengers flying in and out of Aspen, compared to 616,318.

The Aspen/Pitkin County Airport canceled five total flights between Nov. 7 and 14, after the Federal Aviation Administration announced a mandated flight reduction at 40 American airports in the wake of the federal government shutdown. One of ASE’s six daily flights from the Denver International Airport was cancelled on five separate days, according to Tomcich.

“In every case, passengers were given at least 48 hours notice and were able to rebook on alternate flights,” Tomcich wrote in a September and October Fly Aspen Snowmass email update. He added that both American Airlines and Delta Air Lines avoided cancellations. 

With recent plane upgrades and direct routes to Charlotte, North Carolina, and New York City opening on Dec. 19, Tomcich expects a busy winter. 

“We’re going to see as many commercial flights as we’ve ever seen at the Aspen airport,” he said, “with more upgraded aircrafts than we’ve ever seen before.”

Skyler Stark-Ragsdale can be reached at 970-429-9152 or email him at sstark-ragsdale@aspentimes.com.