3 ms·
The number might be right but misleading in a way. Fixed wing commercial aircraft tend to have a LOT of passengers, while helicopters usually have just a handfu
by endymi0n 9y ago
The number might be right but misleading in a way. Fixed wing commercial aircraft tend to have a LOT of passengers, while helicopters usually have just a handful of them. I‘d wager the factor on average load is about 50-100x – which is then also the rate at which fixed-wing aircraft crash less per operational hour. Crashes will just kill many more people, which skews the stats.
- asynchronous13 9y agoNo, it's the low passenger count airplanes that really drive the statistics. In 50 years, there's been 30 crashes of 747s that resulted in loss of life. They are crazy safe. As a comparison, there are more than 200 crashes of Cessna 172 aircraft each year. In 2013 there were more than 1200 small plane crashes resulting in 350+ deaths, but zero large commercial aircraft accidents (in 2009, a 50-passenger plane crashed killing all onboard. There were no 50+ person crashes from 2009-2013) So yes, large scale aircraft are crazy safe and crash less. But small scale airplanes are worse than helicopters.