ARLINGTON, Va. — Getting around the Washington D.C. metro area is not for the faint of heart, especially during rush hour, but could a new flight path be the answer?
That is what people are asking after a viral video grabbed commuters' imagination. It showed an airport gate, claiming to list on its announcement board a Southwest Airlines flight between Ronald Reagan National Airport and Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport.
Going through a security checkpoint and paying the price of a ticket might be preferable some days to sitting in gridlock on the Beltway or getting stuck because of a presidential motorcade.
QUESTION
Does Southwest Airlines offer a flight connecting DCA and BWI?
SOURCES
ANSWER
To the dismay of some long-distance commuters, there is no flight connecting DCA and BWI.
WHAT WE FOUND
Driving between the two airports typically takes 45 minutes, but anyone familiar with Washington D.C. traffic has dreamed of flying over it all to quickly get home.
A video shared on Instagram of a reported flight from DCA to BWI has been seen hundreds of thousands of times, with many comments wondering if the flight would be worth it.
When the VERIFY team attempted to book this flight, Southwest's website shows it is unavailable every day. A check of the flight number's history on FlightAware shows that it did not go to either DCA or BWI in the last three months. And in an emailed statement, a spokesperson for Southwest Airlines confirmed that this is not a route the airline flies.
A spokesperson for Reagan National Airport said it was a repositioning flight. That is when a plane needs to be moved from one airport to another, without any passengers, for logistical purposes.
While the video went viral on Instagram this month, we found the original posted to TikTok nearly two years ago.
If you need to get from one airport to the other but do not want to worry about the traffic, trains and shuttles offer an alternative that can ferry you between airports in less than two hours.