AirlineRatings.com lists top 20 safest airlines in the world, Delta NOT among them
 

I was reading this CNN article (http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/05/aviati...016/index.html) that lists the top 20 safest airlines in the world. Qantas is ranked the highest with "an extraordinary record." American and United are also among the top 20, but surprisingly Delta is not listed. KLM seems to be the only SkyTeam carrier that made the top 20 list. Anyone knows how reputable this website is in ranking the safety of airlines?

I call BS. I wonder how much those airlines paid to be on the list. I'm guessing that RA refused the shakedown.

Delta hasn't had a total loss crash since 1985 (and that wasn't even the airline's fault). Delta has one of the best maintenance divisions in the world, and has a history of not cutting corners when it comes to aircraft safety.

Maybe Delta's crash of an MD88 at LGA last winter had something to do with it not making the top 20.

I don't see a link anywhere to the entire list, just the top 20.

Also without seeing the actual numbers the rankings could look like:
1. QF) .999998
2. AS).999997
3. KL) .999996
.
.
.
21. DL) .999992

Where the difference between 1-50 could be so negligible that a distinction is made only for the creation of a list/rankings/clicks/$$$

I found the article from the source, but it doesn't give any scores or really talk about how the airlines are rank-ordered. http://www.airlineratings.com/news/6...lines-for-2016

I also clicked the link in the article labeled "Read: HOW DO WE SAFETY RATE EACH AIRLINE?" which brought up a list of how they made a 1-7 star rating. http://www.airlineratings.com/safety...g_criteria.php Note that 3 of the 7 stars have nothing to do with the airline but rather the country and that one of the stars is based on flying Russian aircraft.