On 3 October 1946, an aircraft crash claimed the highest death toll in the history of passenger aviation at the time. An American Overseas Airlines (AOA) Douglas DC-4 civilian aircraft crashed into a hillside in Canada due to a navigational error by the pilots, killing all 39 people on board. An American Overseas Airlines flight from New York to Berlin made intermediate stops in Stephenville and Newfoundland, departed Labrador and crashed ten minutes later.
Since that day, the press would widely discuss every air tragedy. The annual number of plane crashes reached its peak in the mid-1970s, with 1972 being the most accident-prone year. This would be linked to an increase in the number of passengers on airlines. In the 1970s, terrorism became a new risk factor. All this would lead to the implementation of stricter standards for aircraft and technical control, higher requirements for crew training and passenger screening. As a result, the average number of people killed in aircraft crashes would more than halve by the mid-1980s. However, over the next 15 years, between 1,000 and 1,500 people died each year in aircraft crashes. Statistics over the past six decades has shown a downward trend: from a peak of 616 crashes with 15,689 deaths in the 1970s to just over 300 crashes and just over 8,000 deaths in the early 2000s. Africa, some Asian countries (Indonesia in particular), Latin America, and Russia would remain the worst affected regions.
It should be noted that, according to statistics, aircraft are the safest means of transport. The probability of dying in a plane crash is approximately 1:2,600,000. The number of victims of plane crashes averages 1,200, while 1.2 million die each year in car accidents. However, the natural fear is that passengers rarely have a chance of surviving an accident on a plane. In 1988, the iconic film “Rain Man” featured the autistic protagonist who analysed the accident and casualty statistics of various companies before buying a ticket. Airline crashes would become part of the post-war reality for humanity.
Source:
Aviation Safety Network Website – https://aviation-safety.net/
