First, there was the Spanair crash in Madrid last Wednesday that killed 154 people; then, 65 passengers were killed in an Itek Air crash in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan; Monday saw an Air Dolmoti plane catch fire at Munich’s airport, forcing some of the passengers to jump to safety, and later that night, a Ryanair flight made an emergency landing at Limoges airport in France after cabin pressure was lost. Sixteen passengers were injured. All of these crashes, as well as the handful of smaller plane crashes here in the States, make one wonder if flying really is the safest mode of travel these days.
Statistics and statisticians love to point out that the chances of being in a plane crash are extremely small. How small? Well, certainly not as small as being struck by lightning and winning the lottery in the same lifetime small, but they’re tiny. They point to the safety records and the numbers of flights per year, the technology that is continually improved on (sometimes after witnessing the tragic shortcomings of something that could have been done better before the crash), and also point to the convenience, if not the comfort, of flying. After all, what would be a two-day car trip from Denver to San Francisco can be done in a couple hours on a plane. Not to mention the fact that auto accidents claim tens of thousands of lives a year, and injure hundreds of thousands more.
Maybe it’s the nature of planes that makes the accidents so much more tragic. The chance of over a hundred people being killed at once is bad, and the crashes usually involve massive explosions and structural damage. While this happens with cars and trucks, explosions are rare and injuries can be minor or even non-existent. Not so with a massive airliner full of jet fuel and reaching very high speeds – or even small four-seat Cessnas. Whatever the reason or reasons, the airline disasters of the last week probably didn’t give potential passengers much faith if they’re flying overseas. What this should do is spur the airline industry to back up their claims that flying is the safest mode of transportation with concrete improvements in planes, mechanics, pilots, and control towers.
If you have lost a loved one in an airline disaster, please contact an experienced aviation accident attorney in your area.
