Facts + Statistics: Aviation and drones

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World Aviation Accidents

In the United States, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) compiles data on aviation flight hours, accidents and fatalities for commercial and general aviation, which is private transport and recreational flying.

World Aviation Losses

There were 37.7 million flights taken in 2023, up from 32.2 million in 2022 and above the five year average of 32.9 million flights, according to the International Air Transport Association (IATA). The global all-accident rate (measured in accidents per one million flights) decreased to 0.80, down from 1.30 in 2022 and the lowest rate in over a decade. The global all-accident rate includes substantial damage and hull loss accidents of aircraft built anywhere in the world and is the most comprehensive accident rate calculated by IATA. A hull loss is an accident in which the aircraft is destroyed or substantially damaged and is not subsequently repaired. 

World Aviation Accidents, 2019-2023 (1)

 

  Accidents    
Year Total Fatal Fatalities Accident rate (2)
2019 54 8 240 1.15
2020 34 4 125 1.53
2021 30 7 121 1.16
2022 42 5 158 1.30
2023 30 1 72 0.80

(1) On Eastern and Western built jet aircraft.
(2) Includes accidents for all aircraft (jets and turboprops) for substantial damage and hull loss per million sectors.

Source: International Air Transport Association (IATA).

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Top 10 Deadliest World Aviation Crashes

 

Rank Date Location Operator Fatalities
1 Mar. 27, 1977 Tenerife, Spain Pan Am, KLM 583
2 Aug. 12, 1985 Mt. Osutaka, Japan JAL 520
3 Mar. 3, 1974 Ermenonville, France Turkish Airlines 346
4 Jun. 23, 1985 Atlantic Ocean Air India 329
5 Nov. 12, 1996 New Delhi, India Saudi Arabian Airlines,
Kazakhstan Airlines		 312
6 Aug. 19, 1980 Riyahd, Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabian Airlines 301
7 Jul. 17, 2014 Shakhtarsk, Ukraine Malaysia Airlines 298
7 Jan. 8, 1996 Kinshasa-Ndolo, Democratic Republic
of Congo		 African Air 298
8 Jul. 3, 1988 Persian Gulf, Iran Iran Air 290
9 Feb. 19, 2003 Kerman, Iran Islamic Revoluntionary
Guard Corps		 275
10 May 25, 1979 Chicago, Illinois, U.S. American Airlines 273

Source: Copyright B3A – Ronan HUBERT – Bureau of Aircraft Accidents Archives.

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Drones

Drones are unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) that are remotely controlled and include small hobbyist models and commercial and military aircraft. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) tracks the number of commercial and recreational drones registered and the number of pilots certified and provides information drone safety.

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