Friday The 13th Flying: AOL Travel Live From The Superstitious Skies

Flying on Friday The 13th. Has it scared flyers away? Not particularly. I'm on Delta Airlines flight 1629 as I write this, and I've got the scoop from my seatmate and KAYAK. Superstition has no room in the air.

I didn't realize I had booked my ticket to Minneapolis on Friday the 13th until a few days later when I checked the date of the conference I was attending. Saturday the 14th, much less ominous.

Not being one for superstition, I forgot about it until I was waiting around in the futuristic Delta lounge at "third world airport" (thanks Donald) La Guardia Airport. Looking around, it was plain to see that most of the flying American public simply does not give a damn about Friday the 13th.

Flights were fully booked, standby lists were filled and departures were delayed due to congestion. Now I'm in the air on Friday the 13th.

Should I be worried?

Flyers Talk Superstition

I asked my seatmates their thoughts on flying on Friday the 13th. One, an attorney living in New York City and flying home to Idaho for a graduation, tells me: "I realized it was Friday the 13th when I booked it, but I'm not that superstitious, and there's also nothing I could do about it."

Is the New York attorney superstitious? "No, not at all. I understand the mythology of Friday the 13th, but it doesn't bother me."

My other neighbor, hogging the window seat, is from Minneapolis and a student at Columbia in New York. I asked him if he is superstitious and he tells me: "Yes and no. I trust my gut feeling, but when it comes to flying on Friday the 13th I have to get to where I'm going so I'm not going to think twice about it."

He continues: "In high school when I played sports I chose the number 13, and I knew it was an unlucky number so I wanted to defy that."

Data Hates Superstition

Data provided to AOL Travel by KAYAK seems to agree with flyers in the air right now and my attorney friend next to me.

According to KAYAK, they looked at the average flight price for the month of May and compared Friday the 13th's airfares against every other Friday in May. Today's ticket prices came in about six percent higher than the average.

Here's a breakdown of ticket prices for the above days,

5/6: $498.96
5/13: $513.30
5/20: $485.07
5/27 (Memorial Day): $ 471.91

Robert Birge, chief marketing officer of KAYAK tells AOL Travel: "While airfare can jump at any time, the spike in price on Friday the 13th we saw on KAYAK shows that airlines aren't as superstitious as their passengers might be. We've seen that people are still flying today and willing to pay the price even if they aren't stepping on cracks and walking under ladders."

But it seems the Brits don't have the same "don't give a damn" attitude as Americans when it comes to Friday the 13th. KAYAK found that in the UK, the average airfare for today is 20.4 percent cheaper than across the rest of the month.

Though we wonder if maybe its just post Royal Wedding fatigue setting in.

Personally, I'm less concerned about Friday the 13th and more worried about choking on one of the fine Delta peanuts I've been graciously offered free of charge.

See you in Minneapolis.