FACTS

1. The FAA outlines risks of flying with a checklist, which stands for: PAVE

• P- Pilot         A- Aircraft           V- environment                 E- External Pressures
  • Pilot risks include physical and emotional health, fatigue, medication, and stress. Pilots can use an addition checklist that the FAA calls the IM SAFE checklist to analyze their own personal risk. The IM SAFE checklist includes illness, medication, stress, alcohol, fatigue, and emotion.
  • Aircraft risks include things like the condition of the airplane, its payload and expected performance under certain conditions (passengers, fuel, etc.) Pilot currency requirements are also included among aircraft risks.
  • Environmental risks are weather conditions, terrain, airports, and airspace, as well as day and night differences.
  • External pressures can come from a pilot’s personal life, but also from others at work or school, including a boss or demanding instructor. Sometimes pilots feel unnecessary pressure to get to a destination no matter what – called “get-there-it is” by the FAA.

STATS

Here are some informative statistics concerning airplane accidents:

• Nearly 80% of all plane crashes happen in the first 3 minutes after takeoff and the last 8 minutes of the plane’s descent.
• An airplane passenger has a 1 in 29.4 million chance of being killed while on that flight. This suggests that planes are, in fact, incredibly safe.
• Pilot error is the leading cause of all fatal airplane accidents as it is the cause of 54% of them.
• There were 40 accidents involving large commercial passenger planes in 2020, five of which were fatal, resulting in 299 deaths.
• Forty-three per cent of all airplane accidents were related to the safety condition of the runway.
• One hundred and forty-seven passengers sustained an injury caused by turbulence.
• According to a recent study of the issue, an estimated 4,500 people are injured every year because of falling luggage on airplanes. These bags fall out of overhead luggage bins because they shift during a flight into dangerous positions, or because overhead bins are loaded beyond their capacity.