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Aviation History
1964
1964 - 1834.PDF
FLIGHT International, 18 June 1964 1011 2-4? ANALYSIS BY CALENDAR YEARS Fig 2a Total jet airliner r t _,_ , , -_r_-_= flying hours, 1959-64 (millions) ^59 V6O "61 "62 '63 "64 3 4 12 , 8 9 lift? —: - 4* 250 255_ 187 "59 '6O "61 '62 "63 '64 '59 '6O '61 '62 '63 '64 350 10 9 "6O *6 150 330 250 130 Fig 2b All operations: total losses (left) and thousands of hours flown per total loss * To June I, 1964 0-66 '59 *6O '61 '62 '63 "64 '59 *6O '61 '62 '63 "64 04 046 04 022 '59 '6O '61 '62 '63 '64 Fig 2c Revenue passenger flights: total losses (left) and thousands Fig 2d Fatal passenger accidents (left) and fatal accident rate per I00,000hrof hours flown per total loss have been steady at around one per 250,000 hours. It appears, then, that on this basis of measurement the jets have made sub- stantial progress, but still have a worse record than their pre- decessors. Total losses on revenue passenger services are shown in Figs lb and 2b. A clear-cut trend is not obvious from the analysis by millions of hours, nor from the analysis by calendar years. How- ever, the average total-loss rate of one per 300,000 hours for the last 4.75 million hours, compared with one per 250,000 hours for the first five million, indicates that there has in fact been a moderate overall improvement, even although it is not immediately apparent from the million-hour and calendar-year breakdowns. So far then, the picture is one of improvement; but what does the jet fatal accident record look like now ? A glance at the breakdown by millions of hours shows that the number of fatal accidents during each of the fifth, sixth andseventh millions was substantially less than in each of the first four millions. Furthermore, analysis by calendar years shows the fatal-accident rate to have fallen in 1963 to a third of the 1959 figure and to roughly half the 1960, 1961 and 1962 figures. (There have been one or two instances in which a jet passenger has been killed when aircraft have encountered severe turbulence but the aircraft has been undamaged. In this and the previous analyses, however, fatal accidents have been taken as accidents in which aircraft have crashed and one or more passengers have been killed. Turbulence accidents are therefore excluded.) The jet fatal accident rate for 1963 of 0.22 per 100,000 hours was also lower than the world-wide fatal accident rate of 0.34 for all types of airliners on scheduled services during the (mainly non-jet) period 1956-60. So it is clear that on this basis of measurement a considerable improvement has been achieved in jet safety during the last year or two, and that the jets have actually improved upon their predecessors' record. But in order to obtain a more precise picture of both long- and short-term changes in the fatal accidentra te, a graphical representation is better. Fatal accidents (aggre- gated) have therefore been plotted against total flying hours (Fig 3). It will be seen that for the first three-and-a-half million hours the curve was fairly steady at a slope approximating one fatal accident Per 200,000 hours. There followed a period of approximately two million hours in which there were only two accidents, and this had the effect of bringing the overall rate down to around one per 300,000 hours. During the next two million the rate remained steady at about one per 300,000 hours. This type of presentation does not, of course, bring out the fact that at the time of writing (June 1) there has not been a fatal accident during approximately 800,000 hours. If this is taken into account, the overall fatal accident rate for the whole 7.75 million hours flown works out at one per 320,000 hours (0.31 per 100,000 hours). But there are, of course, vastly differing degrees of fatal accidents. In some instances only one or two people have been killed, while in others the death toll has unfortunately passed the hundred mark. It is therefore important not to consider the fatal accident rate in isolation, but to take into account the number of passengers killed per million hours (Fig le). As mentioned in the 1963 article, ICAO figures show that during the period 1956-60 the average number of passengers killed per million hours on worldwide scheduled services was 73. Passenger fatalities for the jet have averaged 170 per million hours. A steady improving trend is not indicated by the analysis by Concluded on page 1013 Fig 3 Fatal accidents in- volving passengers, plotted against hours flown 2 3 4 5 6. FLYING HOURS xlm (TOTAL) I'6O|I96I I 1962 I 1963 I 1964 •!
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