SEATTLE — How safe is air travel? Last year, when large commercial jets took off 21.6 million times throughout the world, there was just one fatal accident.
Boeing's comprehensive annual compilation of data about air accidents involving large Western-built jet airliners, released at the end of August, shows a decadeslong trend toward safer air travel.
At the beginning of the jet age, in 1959, there were 40 fatal accidents per million flights. The accident rate fell rapidly and a decade ago was down to less than one fatal accident per million flights. Last year, it was less than 0.05 fatal accidents per million flights.
