Statistics show air travel getting safer
Jan 10, 2001 | 1:18 pm
#1
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Statistics show air travel getting safer
LONDON, England (Reuters) -- The number of airline passenger deaths in 2000 suggests air travel is getting safer.
Aviation consultant Airclaims reported 1,014 passenger deaths globally last year, showing almost no change from the average of the previous two decades despite relentless growth in the volume of travel.
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What are your biggest concerns about air safety?
That means the chance of someone dying during each mile flown has continued to fall.
"For the past 40 years, since about 1960, the average annual number of passenger fatalities has been about 1,000," Airclaims said in its annual review of aviation safety.
1999 was safest year
In 1999, when 518 people died, aviation recorded its safest year since at least World War II, according to Airclaims' data.
Among the 109 people who died in Paris when the supersonic Concorde crashed July 25 on take-off were 100 passengers.
Singapore Airlines in October became one of the few airlines to have lost a 747-400, the latest version of Boeing's jumbo jet. More than 80 died in that crash at Taipei's airport when the crew tried to take off on a partially closed runway.
The Concorde crash prompted authorities to demand changes to the plane's design, but investigators of the Singapore Airlines accident have been concentrating on human error, which is increasingly the cause of aviation disasters.
Better maintenance, better air traffic control
Aviation expert Chris Yates said the industry had now achieved extremely high levels of safety in the developed world.
"Better maintenance is one of the key factors," he said, adding that the other major factor was safer air traffic control.
"These are the two main issues," said Yates, the editor of Jane's Aviation Security.
"Europe, the United States, across the Pacific and Asia-Pacific, Japan, and Australia are extraordinarily safe," he said.
But the cost of crashes last year to airlines and their insurers was the third highest ever, Airclaims reported.
Only 61 aircraft were lost in 2000, compared with an annual average of 66 in the 1980s and 80 in the 1990s. But the total cost of 2000's losses was $912 million, more than double the 1980s average of $402 million and up 15 percent on the 1990s figure of $790 million.
Adding in other liabilities -- for injuries and property damage, for example -- Airclaims estimated aviation insurers would have to pay $1.9 billion for last year's crashes, more than their premiums of only $1.2 billion to $1.3 billion.
Rising traffic
The number of crashes must be set against the airline industry's rising output, however. According to estimates from plane maker Airbus Industrie, traffic doubled during the 1980s alone, growing at an annual average of 6.9 percent.
The 1990s saw 5.2 percent annual growth in traffic, measured by multiplying the number of passengers by the distance they flew.
The number of crashes and the number of deaths have lagged behind that growth.
Still, crashes will present the industry with a growing public-relations problem as traffic develops.
Even if airlines and manufacturers can improve safety, the rising volume of traffic -- more take-offs, landings and hours in cruising flight -- will tend to create more crashes, each of them grabbing media attention and shaking public confidence.
Aviation consultant Airclaims reported 1,014 passenger deaths globally last year, showing almost no change from the average of the previous two decades despite relentless growth in the volume of travel.
MESSAGE BOARD
What are your biggest concerns about air safety?
That means the chance of someone dying during each mile flown has continued to fall.
"For the past 40 years, since about 1960, the average annual number of passenger fatalities has been about 1,000," Airclaims said in its annual review of aviation safety.
1999 was safest year
In 1999, when 518 people died, aviation recorded its safest year since at least World War II, according to Airclaims' data.
Among the 109 people who died in Paris when the supersonic Concorde crashed July 25 on take-off were 100 passengers.
Singapore Airlines in October became one of the few airlines to have lost a 747-400, the latest version of Boeing's jumbo jet. More than 80 died in that crash at Taipei's airport when the crew tried to take off on a partially closed runway.
The Concorde crash prompted authorities to demand changes to the plane's design, but investigators of the Singapore Airlines accident have been concentrating on human error, which is increasingly the cause of aviation disasters.
Better maintenance, better air traffic control
Aviation expert Chris Yates said the industry had now achieved extremely high levels of safety in the developed world.
"Better maintenance is one of the key factors," he said, adding that the other major factor was safer air traffic control.
"These are the two main issues," said Yates, the editor of Jane's Aviation Security.
"Europe, the United States, across the Pacific and Asia-Pacific, Japan, and Australia are extraordinarily safe," he said.
But the cost of crashes last year to airlines and their insurers was the third highest ever, Airclaims reported.
Only 61 aircraft were lost in 2000, compared with an annual average of 66 in the 1980s and 80 in the 1990s. But the total cost of 2000's losses was $912 million, more than double the 1980s average of $402 million and up 15 percent on the 1990s figure of $790 million.
Adding in other liabilities -- for injuries and property damage, for example -- Airclaims estimated aviation insurers would have to pay $1.9 billion for last year's crashes, more than their premiums of only $1.2 billion to $1.3 billion.
Rising traffic
The number of crashes must be set against the airline industry's rising output, however. According to estimates from plane maker Airbus Industrie, traffic doubled during the 1980s alone, growing at an annual average of 6.9 percent.
The 1990s saw 5.2 percent annual growth in traffic, measured by multiplying the number of passengers by the distance they flew.
The number of crashes and the number of deaths have lagged behind that growth.
Still, crashes will present the industry with a growing public-relations problem as traffic develops.
Even if airlines and manufacturers can improve safety, the rising volume of traffic -- more take-offs, landings and hours in cruising flight -- will tend to create more crashes, each of them grabbing media attention and shaking public confidence.
Jan 10, 2001 | 6:47 pm
#2
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...not to mention the effect of the aging airline fleet. Older aircraft, many from the '60s are nearing, and in many cases, have exceeded their cycle design limits. They've been overhauled numerous times, hush-kitted and resold on average (I would guess) about twice by now, winding up for the most part in the Third World. With the double-edged sword of a fragile mechanical state combined with a maintenance program that (how can I put this delicately) is probably slightly less excellent than those of the majors, I unfortunately expect a substantial increase in the overall hull-loss rate in the next decade.