Paris CDG Airport - General info, attractions and delays statistics

Welcome back to Flight-Delayed.com’s weekly airport blog! Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport (sometimes just known as CDG) is Europe’s second largest airport, ferrying just under 70 million passengers around the world in 2017! The airport was named after Charles de Gaulle, who led the Free French Forces during the Second World War. Below we have highlighted some of the most important information about Paris CDG, including general info, delay rates and things to do while you are in Paris!

Charles De Gaulle Airport - General info, attractions and delays statistics

Charles de Gaulle airport first opened in 1974, previously being known as Paris North Airport since planning and construction started in 1966. Since then it has gone from strength to strength to become one of the worlds most used airports! If you have an upcoming flight or layover at CDG then there is plenty you can do during your stay! Some the airports top picks include eating macarons from Laduree (Terminals 1 and 2), free playstation areas, kids play areas and postcards from the airports post office.

Paris CDG is a popular airport of choice for international travel. The airport’s main airlines are Air France, easyJet and Vueling and its most popular international destinations are New York, Barcelona and Dubai! One exciting fact you may not know about CDG is that it was the inspiration for Steven Spielberg's film ‘the terminal’. Between 1988 and 2006, a man called Mehran Karimi Nasseri was forced to live within a terminal at CDG, surviving from kind airport staff and journalists paying for his story!

Things to do while in Paris

Eiffel Tower - no trip to Paris would be an official one without laying eyes on the Eiffel Tower! It is the most visited paid monument in the world, with millions of people ascending the tower each year! If you don’t want to pay to climb the tower, you can still get some amazing views by just standing nearby.

Notre Dame - widely considered to be one of the finest examples of French gothic architecture, Notre Dame is a must see. The cathedral became even more popular after Victor Hugo’s novel “The hunchback of Notre Dame”, which was later turned into a Disney film. If you want to see beautiful stained glass windows and explore history and fiction alike, then Notre Dame is the place for you.

Louvre - Even if art is not your life and soul, it would be a tragedy to visit Paris and not visit the world’s largest and most visited art museum (over 8 million viewers in 2017). Entry tickets cost no more than 9 euro, with free entry on every first Sunday of the month! Not a bad deal to see great artworks such as the Mona Lisa.

Paris Charms and secret tours - While not as famous as the activities above, these tours have a charm to them and encourage active exploration of the city. The tour guides are notoriously enthusiastic and knowledgeable, so there is no doubt that you will go away with a new outlook on this beautiful city.

Delay Rates at Paris CDG

As one of Europe’s busiest airports, it’s no surprise that there are plenty of delayed flights departing from Paris CDG. Using flight-delayed.co.uk’s data on flight delays between January and March 2018 we can see that out of 51’350 flights tracked at CDG, 17’651 of these were delayed!

This results in a weighted on time percentage (OTP) of 65.63%, which means that 65.63% of flights at CDG left within 15 minutes of their scheduled departure. This is much lower than the european airport average in the data of 76.51% flights departing on time. Overall this means that there are a whopping 196 flights delayed each day at CDG airport! I guess it’s not so bad if it leaves you more time to explore everything CDG has to offer!

Claiming compensation for a flight delay at CDG Airport

If you have been delayed at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport then we are here to help! Under EU regulations passengers delayed at any airport in the European Union for more than 3 hours are entitled to up to €600 in compensation! To see if you are entitled to compensation, use our free flight checker. Don’t worry, using this checker is free and non-committal! But if you would like us to make a claim for you then this is on a no-win-no-fee basis, even if we have to take the airline to court on your behalf.

We hope you enjoyed reading this article and are all set to make the most of your time visiting Paris!