Study shows civil aviation 40 times more secure than in 1960s

(MENAFN) A recent study conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has unveiled a significant improvement in the safety of air travel, highlighting that commercial flights have become markedly safer since the early days of mass aviation. The research, published in the *Journal of Air Transport Management*, provides a detailed analysis of the risk of fatality per passenger boarding, showing a dramatic increase in aviation safety over the decades.

According to the study, the risk of a fatal incident during a flight has decreased approximately 39-fold compared to the late 1960s, when large-scale commercial air travel first became widespread. Specifically, the data reveals that the probability of a fatal accident was one in every 350,000 passenger boardings globally between 1968 and 1977. In stark contrast, from 2018 to 2022, this risk had plummeted to one in 13.7 million boardings.

MIT professor Arnold Barnett, a leading authority in aviation safety and one of the study’s co-authors, emphasized the ongoing improvements in aviation safety. He remarked, "You might think there is some irreducible risk level we can’t get below. And yet, the chance of dying during an air journey keeps dropping by about 7 percent annually, and continues to go down by a factor of two every decade."

The researchers liken the progress in air travel safety to an "aerial version of Moore’s Law," which was proposed by Intel co-founder Gordon Moore. Moore’s Law originally predicted that the computing power of microchips would double approximately every 18 months. In a similar vein, the MIT study estimates that the safety of civil aviation has roughly doubled every decade since the late 1960s.

The findings underscore the remarkable advancements in aviation technology and safety protocols, reflecting the ongoing efforts of the industry to enhance passenger safety and reduce the risks associated with air travel.

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