As preoccupied as most frequent travelers are in finding cheap airplane tickets and discount travel packages, safety remains a very important priority. The good news is that last year was the safest in aviation history for travelers flying on jets made in the west.
The global accident rate in 2010 was 0.61 per million flights, meaning that there was one accident for every 1.6 million flights. This record beat the previous low rate of 0.65 set in 2006 and was markedly better than the 0.71 rate in 2009.
There were 17 plane accidents involving jets constructed in the west in 2010 vs. 19 the prior year. Plane accidents are defined as ones in which a plane is destroyed or damaged beyond repair.
There were substantial regional differences in accident rates. North Americas rate was low and Africa ran the highest rate. Africas accident rate of 7.41 was the result of four Western built planes crashing. This was still an improvement over its 2009 rate of 9.94. Africas accident rate was over 12 times the global average.
Runway excursions, defined as when a plane takes off or lands, amounted to 21 percent of the worldwide accidents. Typical reasons for such accidents occur when planes land on wet runways, when aircraft approach at too fast a speed, too high, or land beyond the preferred spot on the runway.
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