Simply because information is publicly available does not mean that it is not credible. According to MIT's Airline Data Project (ADP) site, their analysis was developed:
While
no source of information is without flaws, the folks at the MIT ADP clearly have enough faith in the publicly available information they used to describe it the way they did above.
Even an
"expert" ALPA consultant cited the DOT Form 41 data to support her claims in a legal case from 2013 involving AA's acquisition of TWA. Apparently, ALPA's EFA committee didn't warn her away from pointing to the categorically "suspicious and unreliable," "just trust me bro" nature of the Form 41 data in her submitted testimony to the court. I'm sure opposing counsel was able to "laugh [her] out of the room" for using the mere guesswork that the Form 41 is.
OAG, the global travel data provider, uses DOT Form 41 data to "analyze U.S. airline industry trends, make cost comparisons, benchmark financial performance or plan future activity," They claim they deliver "accurate results" using publicly available information. Can you imagine if their customers found out they use "suspicious and unreliable," "trust me bro" publicly available data in their products? But wait, they tout that fact on their product
web page. And they're still in business selling that publicly-available-information-dependent product.
But, digging around some more today, I did find that SWAPA's comparison of block hours flown, based on
"DIIO" data, shows SWAPA pilots flying only 23% more block hours than Delta pilots. I have no idea if DIIO data is more reliable than the MIT data. But, apparently, SWAPA believes it is, so I'm fine going with that.