The Holy Grail for many travelers is that winning combination of a great price on a plane ticket and no stopovers. Flying direct can save you the hassle and stress of missing a connection, but sometimes, you can save cold hard cash by booking your trip in legs. And it seems that some airports were better at helping passengers make those flights than others last year.

CNBC takes a look at the Bureau of Transportation Statistics’ ranking of the 10 worst U.S. airports for on-time arrivals and departures out of 29 major airports in 2011. So if you can try to avoid a few of these, you might have better luck at making that connection and won’t need to curse the gods of the air for smiting you with aggravation.

Fort Lauderdale – Hollywood International Airport: Coming in as the best of the worst at the 10 spot, 78.88% of flights landed at the terminal on time in Fort Lauderdale. That means the other 21.12% of the time, passengers were frantically running through the terminal if they needed to get on another flight. Since 19.74% of flights didn’t take off on time anyway, many of those passengers were probably just fine.

Philadelphia International Airport: Philly secured a solid position at 7. It’s the 12th busiest airport in the world in terms of traffic movements, so it’s bound to suffer some delays. Around 23.84% of incoming flights and 21.1% going out were affected by delays last year.

LaGuardia Airport: Passengers traveling through or to New York should prepare to face a struggle, as LGA comes in at 3 on the list. It’s part of the largest airport system in the country, and the second-largest in the world. So with traffic, comes delays and hair-pulling — 27.82% of flights arrived late last year and 22.49% took off after their scheduled departure time.

Newark Liberty International Airport: Congratulations, New Jersey — Newark is the innermost circle of hell when it comes to connecting flights. One in three flights, or 33.28% arrived late there last year, and 27.03% lifted off in an untimely manner.

We’re getting stressed just thinking about it.

For more info on the other airports who can’t get the hang of taking off and landing down, check out the source link below.

Worst Airports for Connections [CNBC.com]

Want more consumer news? Visit our parent organization, Consumer Reports, for the latest on scams, recalls, and other consumer issues.