Travelers Rate American as Top U.S. Airline

NEW YORK —  Seasoned American travelers picked American Airlines as the top domestic carrier and Singapore Airlines as the best of the foreign carriers, a survey reported today. The Soviet Union’s Aeroflot finished at the bottom.

Foreign carriers dominated the Zagat Airline Survey, conducted by Research & Forecasts Inc. of New York.

Besides Singapore Airlines, the top 10 in “overall ratings” were Swissair, Japan Air Lines, SAS, Quantas, Lufthansa, KLM, British Airways, Air France and Varig.

In addition to American, the top 10 domestic airlines in best overall ratings were Delta, United, Midway, Piedmont, TWA, Pan Am, Northwest, USAir and Continental.

Aeroflot was named the flying public’s least-favorite airline; it had the lowest ratings in all service and comfort categories.

Financially beleaguered Eastern received the lowest ratings in all categories for a domestic airline--comfort, service, punctuality, food and bang for the buck.

“The airline ranked No. 11, but clearly the highest-rated U.S. domestic airline was American Airlines,” the survey said.

In a special “bang for a buck” rating relating the cost of flights to good service and comfort, Virgin Atlantic and Midway led the list.

Nicholas Tortorello, chairman of Research & Forecasts, said the survey drew on responses from 4,462 “educated” frequent travelers who were asked to rate 27 major U.S. and foreign carriers, list major irritations and suggest innovations.

He said that in selecting the best airlines, some respondents said they picked “only the best of a bad bunch.”

Half of those surveyed said their biggest complaints centered on delays.