Flying Feels Riskier. Here’s What The Experts Say About That High Number Of Accidents.

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• Despite a recent increase in air accidents, experts say commercial air travel in the U.S. remains very safe.
• It's important to distinguish between commercial flights and private or general aviation when analyzing accident data.
• Aviation safety is a continuous improvement process, with a strong culture of reporting and learning from mistakes.

After two high-profile commercial plane crashes at U.S. airlines this year, travelers have been left wondering if flying is still safe.  

Statistically speaking, it is, but those statistics themselves can be a little confusing. A cursory glance at numbers from the National Transportation Safety Board will show 67 deaths in commercial plane crashes this year – a huge upward surge after zero deaths last year and very out of line with the 10-year trend in which commercial aviation deaths have generally been measured in the single digits. 

However, it’s important to remember that flying remains safe, and there’s context to the number of accidents recorded by aviation professionals. 

“Fortunately, accidents, especially in the past 25 years have been very rare events in the U.S. air carriers,” Kristy Kiernan, Associate Director at the Boeing Center for Aviation and Aerospace Safety at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, told USA TODAY. “I spent 12 years flying in the Coast Guard, we would go a year without anything happening at all, and the next year, if we had one, it would be an infinite increase.” 

There have been six air carrier accidents logged by the National Transportation Safety Board so far this year. However, not all six involved fatalities, and that number does not include small private aircraft, which typically account for the highest share of overall aviation incidents every year.

Airplane accidents are virtually never caused by a single factor, and it’s hard to compare two incidents, so looking at the overall number of accidents each year isn’t always helpful. 

“These are understandably headline issues. Given the number of people who fly and given the exposure that these incidents get, it’s not surprising that there would be some concern if not alarm about them,” Robert W. Mann Jr., a former airline executive officer and current president of R. W. Mann and Co., an independent airline consultancy, told USA TODAY. “The accident rates historically and to this day differ dramatically by the category of flying.” 

Aggregate data on airplane incidents often includes private, charter and general aviation as well as the commercial flights that the vast majority of people travel on. So, to get a real understanding of the risks involved in flying, it’s important to not take too broad a view. 

“If you’re looking at accident rates and trends, you want to make sure you’re looking at something that reflects the operations you’re interested in. For most people that’s going to say the scheduled air carrier, which is incredibly safe,” Kiernan said. “There are numerous differences from somebody who is an airplane owner and goes out to fly themselves on a Saturday afternoon to when you get on your airplane at JFK. Differences in training requirements, in maintenance requirements.” 

The midair collision over the Potomac River in January was the first fatal plane crash of a U.S. airliner since 2009, but that doesn’t mean there have been no commercial aviation-related fatalities in nearly 16 years in the U.S.  

In 2013, an Asiana Airlines flight from Seoul landed short of the runway in San Francisco and three people died.  

In 2018, a Southwest Airlines flight suffered an engine malfunction which damaged the fuselage, resulting in an explosive decompression of the cabin that sucked one passenger, Jennifer Riordan, partially out of the aircraft. She died as a result of her injuries. 

Other fatal accidents have occurred in the intervening years involving small aircraft that operated under different, more relaxed rules than those that govern scheduled commercial flights, including the ones involved in both of this year’s most high-profile incidents.  

Still, experts say it’s too soon to know what to make of what’s happening so far in 2025 in aviation. 

“Are they anomalies or signs of a broader issue? I’m not sure yet. It’s not that it’s a perfect system,” Kiernan said, but quickly added that aviation’s safety net is robust. 

Just like how aviation incidents don’t have a single cause, the strong safety record of the industry isn’t down to a single factor, either. 

“Aviation has been evolving for 35 years more and more towards what we call a just culture. It’s accountability but not blaming and shaming, removing and replacing. It’s transparency, trust, continuous learning. All of that has built up a culture in aviation, a successful safety culture where people feel free to report if they’ve made a mistake,” Kiernan said. “When you’re honestly doing the best you can, you’re not blamed for a mistake. You’re held accountable for your actions, but error is something that is looked at as something that the system can correct. It’s non-punitive, and that’s absolutely critical. That’s as big a factor as any.” 

So far this year, there has been only one fatal accident involving an aircraft in the U.S., up from zero over the last two years, as shown in the graph below.

She said the overall posture in the industry of being prepared to report and learn from mishaps is key to keeping flying safe, and continually making it safer. 

“We have a very strong, just culture as an industry. We have processes that are pretty rigorous in terms of identifying hazards and we have technology that helps us mitigate those,” Kiernan said. Mann agreed that the industry’s own self-reflection is one of the crucial aspects of its safety record. 

“What happened and what can we learn? The only way you drive these rates down is by eliminating factors that can contribute to the incidents,” he said. “You don’t stay safe without the involvement of every individual. It’s the safety culture that is promulgated and maintained at the operators involved.” 

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Both Mann and Kiernan agreed that flying remains extremely safe, but that making aviation safer is a project that’s never finished. 

“It’s not like there’s no work to be done, there is. That is an aspect of continuous improvement, but the very existence of this thing that we’re concentrating on, continuous improvement, is exactly why I would get on a plane today, tomorrow, put my kids on a plane, I do that regularly,” Kiernan said. 

“It’s a very safe system, it can always be safer. The objective always is zero, but achieving zero is a heady goal while you constantly increase the amount of activity,” Mann added. 

And in the meantime, Kiernan said, knowledge – like being aware of the emergency exit locations and the procedures on the seatback safety card – is power for nervous passengers. 

“I tell people don’t worry about flying, but that doesn’t mean you’re not really and truly anxious and there aren’t things you can’t do to help mitigate that anxiety,” she said. “Empower yourself with knowledge. That will help people get a risk perception that is a little bit closer to the objectively really low risk that they actually face when they get on an airplane.” 

Contributing: Jennifer Borresen, USA TODAY

Zach Wichter is a travel reporter and writes the Cruising Altitude column for USA TODAY. He is based in New York and you can reach him at zwichter@usatoday.com.