6 ms·

> However the method, it's far more likely to injure you than flying on a 737 MAX. That depends. If you take a bus to go to the airport and it takes you an hou

by shock 6y ago

> However the method, it's far more likely to injure you than flying on a 737 MAX. That depends. If you take a bus to go to the airport and it takes you an hour to get there, then your flight also lasts an hour (for simplicity's sake), you are almost 3 times more likely(on average) to die during the flight than you are during the bus ride [0]. In terms of number of journeys by plane and bus, for the same number of journeys you are 27 times more likely to die in a plane accident. People repeat the "plane is the safest way to travel" mantra, but it's only true in terms of nr. of km traveled. [0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aviation_safety https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aviation_safety

shajznnckfke 6y ago
Other than that one time JetBlue ran a shuttle flight from one end of LA to the other for a publicity stunt, it don’t think this comparison makes sense. An hour bus ride isn’t a substitute for an hour plane ride.
- zucker42 6y ago
  He was responding to the claim that "you're more likely to die on your way to the airport".
  - shock 6y ago
    Thank you. I thought it was self evident. I've amended my post to make it clearer.
- shock 6y ago
  Another way to think about it would be: you have (roughly) the same chance of dying in a 3 hour flight as in an 9 hour bus ride.
bhupy 6y ago
This is a great argument that I'd never heard before. Never knew about the per-hour statistics either. All that being said, it sounds like one can "control the level of risk" by taking a bus instead of driving/Uber/Lyft/taxi to the airport, but choosing to do the latter is an example of "taking on any unnecessary risk when you don't have to [which] is not a wise choice". And yet it is a completely reasonable thing to do.
curryst 6y ago
Measuring the risk of travel in terms of hours seems largely pointless, unless I'm missing something. It equates an hour bus ride with an hour plane ride, which are not interchangeable, so it makes sense that the associated risks are also not interchangeable. You could account for the additional time it takes to go on a bus to adjust for the longer duration of risk, but at that point it seems like you're just approximating for risk per km.
- shock 6y ago
  > Measuring the risk of travel in terms of hours seems largely pointless, unless I'm missing something. Again, it depends on what you're trying to measure. If you're trying to quantify the risk of dying by accident at a certain hour, what activity you are doing in that hour is highly relevant. If you are trying to quantify the risk of dying by accident while going from A to B, then it's not (that) relevant.
  - chii 6y ago
    > If you're trying to quantify the risk of dying by accident at a certain hour, what activity you are doing in that hour is highly relevant. and this is an irrelevant measure, because by that logic, most people sleep for about 8hrs a day, so the chance they die in their sleep is high!? You measure risk _only_ against what it rewards you. Otherwise, why take the risk at all? Therefore, measuring the risk of air-travel has to be accompanied by a comparison to bus-travel (or rail and/or boat), and measurement should be by distance travelled.
- caconym_ 6y ago
  I think it makes a lot more sense to look at risk per time, because it's basically the same thing as risk per trip, and that's what I really care about. If you tell me I can fly to Mars in a few days on a brachistochrone torchship and it's safer per mile than any other mode of transport, you may be right, and a few days cooped up in a cramped cabin might be a small price to pay for such an exotic vacation destination, but that risk calculus is really very misleading. The distance involved is so vast that per mile it could be an absurdly low figure by any terrestrial standard while still carrying an absurdly high (by the same standards) risk of death during the trip. In other words, if the odds are e.g. 1 in 10 that the trip will kill me, I don't give a shit how low the risk per mile is.
esperent 6y ago
Deaths per billion: |Journeys | Hours | KM Bus| 4.3 | 11.1 | 0.4 Air| 117 | 30.8 | 0.05 That's really interesting. Per KM, air is way safer than bus, but per journey it's roughly the same degree in the other direction. I'm having a hard time saying which one is safer from that data. However, both are very, very safe. I would like to see "Air" replaced by "737 Max" though.
- igravious 6y ago
  Huh? That's interesting! Don't tell me that when people tout the safety of air transport they're using deaths per billions of km rather than per (billions of) journeys. Journeys is the important metric, surely!
  - esperent 6y ago
    The median bus journeys is probably about 20 minutes long since intercity journeys are probably dwarfed in number by city busses, so I'm not sure per journey is the best metric here. Per hour or per KM seems better, or possible take a weighted average of all three.

by shock 6y ago

shajznnckfke 6y ago

Other than that one time JetBlue ran a shuttle flight from one end of LA to the other for a publicity stunt, it don’t think this comparison makes sense. An hour bus ride isn’t a substitute for an hour plane ride.

zucker42 6y ago
He was responding to the claim that "you're more likely to die on your way to the airport".
- shock 6y ago
  Thank you. I thought it was self evident. I've amended my post to make it clearer.
shock 6y ago
Another way to think about it would be: you have (roughly) the same chance of dying in a 3 hour flight as in an 9 hour bus ride.

bhupy 6y ago

This is a great argument that I'd never heard before. Never knew about the per-hour statistics either. All that being said, it sounds like one can "control the level of risk" by taking a bus instead of driving/Uber/Lyft/taxi to the airport, but choosing to do the latter is an example of "taking on any unnecessary risk when you don't have to [which] is not a wise choice". And yet it is a completely reasonable thing to do.

curryst 6y ago

Measuring the risk of travel in terms of hours seems largely pointless, unless I'm missing something. It equates an hour bus ride with an hour plane ride, which are not interchangeable, so it makes sense that the associated risks are also not interchangeable. You could account for the additional time it takes to go on a bus to adjust for the longer duration of risk, but at that point it seems like you're just approximating for risk per km.

shock 6y ago
> Measuring the risk of travel in terms of hours seems largely pointless, unless I'm missing something. Again, it depends on what you're trying to measure. If you're trying to quantify the risk of dying by accident at a certain hour, what activity you are doing in that hour is highly relevant. If you are trying to quantify the risk of dying by accident while going from A to B, then it's not (that) relevant.
- chii 6y ago
  > If you're trying to quantify the risk of dying by accident at a certain hour, what activity you are doing in that hour is highly relevant. and this is an irrelevant measure, because by that logic, most people sleep for about 8hrs a day, so the chance they die in their sleep is high!? You measure risk _only_ against what it rewards you. Otherwise, why take the risk at all? Therefore, measuring the risk of air-travel has to be accompanied by a comparison to bus-travel (or rail and/or boat), and measurement should be by distance travelled.
caconym_ 6y ago
I think it makes a lot more sense to look at risk per time, because it's basically the same thing as risk per trip, and that's what I really care about. If you tell me I can fly to Mars in a few days on a brachistochrone torchship and it's safer per mile than any other mode of transport, you may be right, and a few days cooped up in a cramped cabin might be a small price to pay for such an exotic vacation destination, but that risk calculus is really very misleading. The distance involved is so vast that per mile it could be an absurdly low figure by any terrestrial standard while still carrying an absurdly high (by the same standards) risk of death during the trip. In other words, if the odds are e.g. 1 in 10 that the trip will kill me, I don't give a shit how low the risk per mile is.

esperent 6y ago

Deaths per billion: |Journeys | Hours | KM Bus| 4.3 | 11.1 | 0.4 Air| 117 | 30.8 | 0.05 That's really interesting. Per KM, air is way safer than bus, but per journey it's roughly the same degree in the other direction. I'm having a hard time saying which one is safer from that data. However, both are very, very safe. I would like to see "Air" replaced by "737 Max" though.

igravious 6y ago
Huh? That's interesting! Don't tell me that when people tout the safety of air transport they're using deaths per billions of km rather than per (billions of) journeys. Journeys is the important metric, surely!
- esperent 6y ago
  The median bus journeys is probably about 20 minutes long since intercity journeys are probably dwarfed in number by city busses, so I'm not sure per journey is the best metric here. Per hour or per KM seems better, or possible take a weighted average of all three.