Airline accident deaths highest for eight years

The number of deaths in passenger airliner accidents worldwide from January to June 2002 was the highest total for the first half of a year for eight years, it was revealed today.

The 716 fatalities figure was far in excess of the 114 in the first six months of 2001 and was the worst since 1994 when 741 people died in the January-June period, statistics from Flight International magazine revealed.

The 2002 figures do not include the July 1 mid-air crash of a Boeing 757 freighter, piloted by Briton Paul Phillips, and a Bashkirian Airlines passenger plane over southern Germany in which 71 people died.

“Airline safety in the first half of 2002 was dismal compared with the same period last year, which was exceptionally good,” said Flight’s operations and safety editor David Learmount.

He went on: “The killer accident categories that the industry hoped it was beginning to resolve, such as controlled flight into terrain (CFIT) are still a serious problem. Now, the second half of 2002 has started disastrously with a mid-air collision.”

He added that the southern Germany mid-air collision had shocked the aviation industry as the pilots’ airborne collision avoidance system had worked correctly but had failed to prevent the collision because of “procedural and human factors in the air and flawed safety backup for the controller on the ground”.

“There will be much industry work now to ensure that the lessons this accident are learned worldwide,” said Mr Learmount.

Flight said that of the 18 accidents involving fatalities in the first half of 2002, nine appeared to be CFIT occurrences. Human error was a likely factor in 13 of these 18 crashes and in all of the CFIT crashes, said the magazine.

Flight said the geographic spread of fatal accidents did not appear to be changing, with North America, Europe and Australasia having good safety records and the rest of the world “not so good”.