Airlines may be in the doldrums, but one statistic is at least cause for rejoicing: accidents were down globally last year to the second-lowest level in aviation history.
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) said yesterday the 2009 rate for accidents – defined as serious enough to write off the aircraft – was 0.71. This means that for every million flights, the accident rate was 0.71, or one accident per 1.4 million flights worldwide.
“This is a significant improvement of the 0.81 rate recorded in 2008 (one accident for 1.2 million flights),” IATA said. “The 2009 rate was the second-lowest in aviation history, just above the 2006 rate of 0.65. Compared with 10 years ago, the accident rate has been cut 36 per cent from the rate recorded in 2000.”
Steve Lott, spokesperson for IATA North America, said from Washington, D.C., the figures take into account Western-built jets, which account for the vast majority of flights outside of Russia and China.