COMMERCIAL aviation last year saw the fewest jet hull losses but a rise in total fatalities, according to a safety performance assessment released by the International Air Transport Association (IATA).
The report shows that 2014’s global jet accident rate (measured in hull losses per one million flights) was 0.23, historically the lowest and the equivalent of one accident for every 4.4 million flights, as well as an improvement over 2013’s 0.41 and over the 2009-2013 rate of 0.58.
There were 12 fatal accidents involving all aircraft types in 2014 with 641 fatalities, compared with an average of 19 fatal accidents and 517 fatalities per year in the 2009-2013 period.
The jet hull loss rate for IATA members was 0.12 (one accident for every 8.3 million flights), outperforming the global average by 48 per cent and significantly improving from the five-year rate of 0.33.
Tony Tyler, IATA’s director general and CEO, said: “Any accident is one too many and safety is always aviation’s top priority. While aviation safety was in the headlines in 2014, the data show that flying continues to improve its safety performance.”
The report also classifies the disappearance and loss of Malaysia Airlines’ MH370 as a fatal accident, but excludes the destruction of MH17 by anti-aircraft weaponry in Ukraine as an accident.
Ironically, as aviation becomes ever safer, there are so few accidents that they cannot yield the trend data vital to a systemic risk-based approach to improving safety, so future safety gains will come increasingly from analysing data from the more than 38 million flights that operate safely yearly.
IATA has thus created the Global Aviation Data Management (GADM) programme including analysis reports covering accidents, incidents, ground damage, maintenance and audits, plus data from nearly two million flights and over one million air safety reports.
More than 470 organisations, including more than 90 per cent of IATA member airlines, are participating in at least one GADM database.
Additionally, IATA’s Six Point Safety Strategy serves to identify organisational, operational and emerging safety issues.
