What Swapped does

Swapped looks at cancelled flights and follows the aircraft that was on the flight’s record, by its registration (the letters painted on the plane, such as C-GEJL). If that same aircraft operated another flight from the same airport around the time the cancelled one was due to leave, we show it as a possible same-aircraft match, along with the records behind it.

It is an aircraft timeline you can check, not a finding about why a flight was cancelled.

A worked example

This is a real case from 25 Oct 2026. Times are local to Toronto and Fort Myers, both on Eastern Daylight Time (UTC−4) that day.

1. 11:41 EDT Aircraft C-GEJL lands in Toronto from Cancún as AC 1811.
2. 14:10 EDT AC 1014, Toronto to Fort Myers, is due to leave. Its record lists C-GEJL. The flight is cancelled.
3. 14:32 EDT C-GEJL takes off from Toronto as AC 1664, also to Fort Myers. AC 1664 was scheduled for 14:25.
4. Evening AC 1015, the return flight, is cancelled too. C-GEJL lands back in Toronto at 21:12 EDT as AC 1665.

What the records show: the aircraft was in Toronto in time for AC 1014, and it left 22 minutes after AC 1014’s scheduled departure on the same route under another number. That usually means two flights were combined.

What they don’t show: why AC 1014 was cancelled, or when C-GEJL was assigned to it. We only looked after the day was over. The two records also share one callsign (ROU1664), so they may describe a single movement listed under two flight numbers. The case is marked uncertain for that reason.

See the full AC 1014 case

What a match needs

We only consider flights the source lists as cancelled (not “possibly cancelled”) that have an aircraft registration on the record. Then all of these have to hold:

• The aircraft was at the departure airport when the flight was due to leave. Either its previous flight had landed there by then (15 minutes’ grace), or it had been there since its first flight of the day.
• The same aircraft then actually took off from that airport as a different flight. A scheduled or unknown status isn’t enough.
• It took off between an hour before the cancelled flight’s scheduled departure and an hour after its scheduled arrival.
• That other flight was scheduled no more than an hour before the cancelled one, so an earlier flight running late doesn’t count.

That window is a detection window. A flight inside it isn’t proof that the cancelled flight lost its aircraft to it. So every case also answers these questions, with the records shown:

• Was the aircraft at the origin, and what was its previous movement?
• Did the other flight really depart, and how do we know (runway time, revised time or status only)?
• Could the aircraft have operated both flights as planned, allowing 40 minutes on the ground at each end?
• Are there gaps or conflicts in the records?
• Was the other flight a separate scheduled flight, or something the data can’t pin down, such as a diversion, an air return, a positioning flight or the same flight under a second number?

A flight sold under two airline codes is one movement, and we count it once. An air return or a flight with no schedule is never used as the other flight. When the data can’t tell the situations apart, the case says so and is marked uncertain.

Each case also says how well the aircraft assignment itself is supported:

• Pre-cancellation assignment confirmed. We saw the aircraft on the flight in a snapshot taken before departure and before any cancellation.
• Assignment timing unknown. The aircraft is on the record, but we only looked afterwards, so we can’t say whether it was assigned before the flight was cancelled. Every case so far is at this level.
• Inferred aircraft. The record had no aircraft, and we worked it out from other data.

What it can’t tell you

This evidence does not establish the cancellation’s cause, its regulatory category or entitlement to compensation.

An aircraft flying elsewhere can happen for many reasons: a crew shortage, a maintenance or safety decision, a storm elsewhere in the network, or two half-full flights being combined. From the outside these can look the same.

Under Canada’s Air Passenger Protection Regulations, what an airline owes depends on how the cancellation is classified: within the airline’s control, within its control but required for safety, or outside its control. The airline decides the category and has to tell passengers the reason. The Canadian Transportation Agency handles disputes. Swapped doesn’t classify cancellations.

Weather, airport notices and safety reports appear on a case as context. Each one says whether it matches this aircraft or only the airport and day. Conditions earlier in the day or at another airport can still affect a flight, so a quiet weather report doesn’t rule weather out.

Swapped shows flight data only and isn’t legal advice.

Data sources, updates and gaps

Flight status and aircraft registrations come from AeroDataBox (airport departure boards and each aircraft’s flight list). We collect a day after it’s over, so the data shows how things ended, not when they changed.

Coverage is limited to the airports and dates on the Coverage page. A flight that isn’t there may still have been cancelled, and a cancellation with no aircraft on its record can’t be checked at all.

Context comes from METAR weather reports (Iowa Environmental Mesonet and aviationweather.gov), NAV CANADA airport notices from snapshots we take, Transport Canada’s CADORS safety reports (Open Government Licence – Canada) and ADS-B tracks from adsb.lol (© adsb.lol contributors, ODbL 1.0) and the OpenSky Network when available. Airport locations come from OurAirports and map outlines from Natural Earth.

Corrections

Every case has a “Report an error” link. Tell us what looks wrong and, if you can, where the right information is. We check it against the source records.

When a case changes, its page shows a change history with the date, what changed and why. If a case no longer meets the rule, its link stays up and says when and why it was removed.

Official passenger information

Flight delays and cancellations (CTA)
How to contact the airline
Air travel complaints (CTA)