How to Analyze and Reduce Airline Flight Delays
Overview
This question evaluates a data scientist's competencies in statistical reasoning, exploratory data analysis, hypothesis testing, regression and mixed-effects modeling, uncertainty quantification, and translating analytical results into operational metrics for flight delays.
Capital One
Aug 4, 2025, 10:55 AM
Data Scientist
Technical Screen
Statistics & Math
21
0
Scenario
Statistics role-play: investigating airline flight delays
Task
Design and execute a statistical analysis to understand and reduce airline flight delays.
What to Cover
- Clear objectives and hypotheses.
- Required data and how you'd prepare it.
- Descriptive analyses and diagnostic checks.
- Statistical tests and models (e.g., hypothesis testing, regression).
- How you will quantify and communicate uncertainty.
- How findings translate into actionable operational recommendations.
Hints
- Use descriptive statistics and visualizations to profile delays.
- Formulate and test hypotheses (t-tests, nonparametric tests, ANOVA).
- Build regression/GLM or mixed models to separate drivers.
- Use confidence intervals, prediction intervals, bootstrapping, or Bayesian methods.
- Tie results to actions (staffing, scheduling, routing, padding).
Solution
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