MIT: ‘risk of dying in a plane crash has halved every decade’

Flying is getting safer and safer. A study by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) shows that the risk of dying on a plane flight has halved every decade since the late 1960s. Between 2018 and 2022, the average was one death for every 13.7 million passengers worldwide, compared with one death for every 7.9 million passengers between 2008 and 2017 and one death for every 350,000 passengers between 1968 and 1977.

Chance of dying in flight decreases by 7% per year

“Aviation safety continues to improve,” writes Arnold Barnett, professor at MIT and co-author of the study published in the specialized journal Journal of Air Transport Management. “You might think there is some irreducible risk level we can’t get below,” adds Barnett. “And yet, the chance of dying during an air journey keeps dropping by about 7% annually and continues to go down by a factor of two every decade.”

This is Barnett’s picture of commercial air travel fatalities per passenger boarding.

1968-1977:      1 per 350,000
1978-1987:      1 per 750,000
1988-1997:      1 per 1.3 million
1998-2007:     1 per 2.7 million
2007-2017:     1 per 7.9 million
2018-2022:     1 per 13.7 million

However, according to Barnett, there are no guarantees of continual improvement. Recently, there were some near collisions on runways in the US while manufacturer Boeing was caught in a storm after a door panel broke during an Alaska Airlines 737 Max 9 flight. And in Nepal, just a few weeks ago, a plane crashed with 19 people on board. To say that airline safety is always an ongoing task.

Differences per country

According to Barnett, the remarkable improvement in the numbers per decade comes mainly because of technological advances, such as collision avoidance systems in planes, extensive training, and the different government aviation agencies, such as the United States Federal Aviation Agency and the National Transportation Safety Board, in the case of the US.

Furthermore, the researchers highlight that differences are observed depending on the country. The safest list includes the United States, members of the European Union, Montenegro, Norway, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, China, Israel, Japan, and New Zealand.

Category two includes Bahrain, Bosnia, Brazil, Brunei, Chile, Hong Kong, India, Jordan, Kuwait, Malaysia, Mexico, the Philippines, Qatar, Singapore, South Africa, South Korea, Taiwan, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates.

Although aviation risks are higher in the remaining countries, which constitute category three, they have halved over 2018-2022. The researchers comment that there is some evidence, however, that in-flight transmission of Covid-19 may have caused thousands of passenger deaths.