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check cashing places to cash, and incur fees for doing so right off the bat. Then you incur the risk of carrying that much cash around with you everywhere too.

So the bank is supposed to take this risk you don't want to take and guarantee the safety of your money at no cost?
The alternative is for you to hire a security company to escort the money to your safe.

Try to make a major purchase and the country flags you as a terrorist suspect the minute you make a large cash payment for it!

Wrong, they flag your transaction for review. Two very different things.

Try to take cash on an airline flight and again

If you are crossing borders that makes absolute sense. If you aren't crossing borders you can carry as much money as you want. You should notify TSA ahead of travels: http://www.airsafe.com/issues/...

since there's no record of you having your name on a savings or checking account or any other real credit history.

Would you loan your money to someone else without a way to check who they are and how reliable they are? Probably not. Borrowing money is not a given right, it's a privilege that's become a standard in our society but that still requires validation.

What did the banks actually do to you to make you hate them OR are you one of the sheeps that flames said entities because it's the popular thing to do?

In my life banks have allowed me to collect interest on savings, build large gains on mutual funds and borrow money at low interest rates. I'm not sure where they screwed me. Are we talking about the $2-$4 / month I get charged for transactions?

As if no 747s have ever crashed. Oh wait 3748 people have died [wikipedia.org] on 747s since they entered service.

You really want to go on making pointless comparisons between completely different planes?

I started out to make a comparison which you could not validly claim is pointless.

1510 Boeing 747s have been built. I was able to identify 29 crashes and (non homicidal) incidents involving fatalities. That's an accident rate of 1.9%. Or take your number killed. It computes to 2.5 per plane.

20 Concordes were built. One crashed. That's an accident rate rate of 5.0%. Or take the death count of 113 - that is 5.7 per plane.

In the end I was actually very surprised how close both statistics were. In actuality, the statistical basis for the Concorde is too limited. If the Concorde had been retired after 27 years instead of 30, both numbers would have been 0.0. Or look at the record of LZ 127 class rigid airships - only one was built, Graf Zeppelin - zero fatalities in slightly over one million miles. On the other hand, the record of LZ 129 class - two were built, Hindenburg and Graf Zeppelin II - accident rate: 50%; killed: 18 per airframe.

...and realize the youngest of those birds was more than 30 years old. Which is pretty well EOL for airliners.

fleet age You'd be surprised how many airlines operate how many big jets close to that age... and I doubt they see 30 as EOL. Some airlines, in the north, operate planes averaging 80 years old, but its well understood you don't want to be flying in anything else that in cold, the old planes are the safest. I don't think that translates to the big jets (like Boeing 700 series) though. Chances are about equal you've never been on a Boeing that is under 30 years old.

Boeing 777 series is not yet 30 years old, and 787 (which not many have been on yet) is only a couple years old; and many sub-models of various other 700 series are also not 30 years old yet. And that's just Beoing. Airbus has similar aircraft.

So there is probably a 50/50 chance for people having been on an aircraft under 30 years of age versus one that is over 30 years of age.

...and realize the youngest of those birds was more than 30 years old. Which is pretty well EOL for airliners.

fleet age You'd be surprised how many airlines operate how many big jets close to that age... and I doubt they see 30 as EOL. Some airlines, in the north, operate planes averaging 80 years old, but its well understood you don't want to be flying in anything else that in cold, the old planes are the safest. I don't think that translates to the big jets (like Boeing 700 series) though. Chances are about equal you've never been on a Boeing that is under 30 years old.

Yeah, the DC-10's fatal accident rate isn't appreciably different from other planes of its era. It's a safe aircraft. It only picked up the reputation of being unsafe because of a grouping of accidents (two of which were MD's fault because of the cargo door problem), which sealed public opinion against it. Kinda like Malaysia Airlines' reputation has taken a permanent hit after the enormous publicity surrounding the loss of two of its airliners within 4 months of each other.

A300 = 0.61 fatal accidents per million flights
727 = 0.5
737-100/200 = 0.61
747-100/200/300 = 1.02
DC-9 = 0.56
DC-10 = 0.65
L-1011 = 0.48

(Note that when you get into incidents which occur this infrequently, the margin of error starts to become huge relative to the actual incident rate. So you can calculate the rate to as many decimal places as you want, but it's pretty meaningless. The above are statistically indistinguishable - (bad) luck played a larger role than the airworthiness of any aircraft type.)

For actual rates you may find this more informative.

Every time I fly back from the states I have a note from the TSA saying they looked in my bag. They are authorised to search for vibrating objects, as well as remove and tamper with them

Pretty much every time I've flown in the last 11 years -- which is as little as possible -- I find open zippers and sometimes stuff falling out of my bags. And they never even leave me a note. I assume they were just looking for something worth stealing, but apparently the possibility of getting caught and punished is so remote that they don't even need to attempt to cover their tracks.

Except that the passenger was not present -- the offending article was in a checked bag.

an electric toothbrush began vibrating inside a bag checked onto an AirTran flight

You think baggage handlers are authorized to do anything but hit the panic button?

Every time I fly back from the states I have a note from the TSA saying they looked in my bag. They are authorised to search for vibrating objects, as well as remove and tamper with them

A320 crashes http://www.airdisaster.com/cgi-bin/view_details.cgi?date=03221998&reg=RP-C3222&airline=Philippine+Airlines

The aircraft overran runway 4 while landing. A malfunction of the onboard flight computers prevented power from being reduced to idle, which inhibited thrust reverse and spoilers from being used. The offending engine was shut down, and brakes applied, but the aircraft was unable to stop before the end of the runway

I couldn't read the article you referenced ("server not responding"), but the accident report states this was caused by pilot error, not malfunctioning computers. From Wikipedia: "A selection by the pilot of the wrong mode on the onboard flight computers prevented power from being reduced to idle, which inhibited thrust reverse and spoilers from being used. The offending engine was shut down, and brakes applied, but the aircraft was unable to stop before the end of the runway".

There's a surprising number of people who believe that the high level of automation on Airbus is intrinsically more dangerous, but the figures show that the Airbus A320 is the safest narrow-body jet you can fly on. It's true that automated stuff can go wrong, but this can be more than compensated for by the ways it makes flying (or driving) safer.

They need to get out of the airplane manufacturing business... although, bases on the moon may require slightly higher precision and quality control.

http://en.ria.ru/world/20120523/173624567.html

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/remains-45-russian-plane-crash-victims-idd-16392707

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Lokomotiv_Yaroslavl_air_disaster

http://www.airsafe.com/events/airlines/fsu.htm

All your base, are belong to us.

How many dozens of 9/11's happen each year as a result of smoking and alcohol?

I challenge you to provide one example of an airplane being piloted into a building because of smoking and alcohol. Stop whining about helping real people, and join the fight the help the real heroes... the ones who died in 9/11.

http://www.health20-20.org/article/18/for-your-information/alcohol-drug-abuse/alcohol-drug-use-and-air-accidents
http://www.airsafe.com/events/us_ten.htm

That aside, I've witnessed a gaping hole in a building in my city caused by a pilot who had been drinking.
But I believe that's beside the point. 9/11 was about more than the twin towers; another plane load of people deliberately crashed their plane with no buildings in site.

The truth is that even people texting while driving are more of a national security threat than terrorists. This is obviously the point the GP was making; attempting to make the reference more literal is more than a bit disingenuous.

On Airbus vehicles, if the avionics computers crash, the airplane crashes. There's exactly ZERO way to pilot the computer manually in such a failure.

Completely untrue. When the avionics 'crash', the flight system progresses through 'alternate' to 'direct' law where the pilot has direct control of the plane.

Moreover, the avionics system can and does overrule pilot input. So if you get sensor malfunctions like this, even if the pilot is trying desperately to save the plane, the computer can still crash you.

Have a look at the statistics (pages maintained by a pro-Boeing pilot, by the way) and you'll see (i) for all your hysterical fear of Airbus aircraft, the fly-by-wire Airbus aircraft (i.e. all except A300 and A310) are just as safe as their Boeing counterparts (ii) there are no examples of an Airbus crash caused by the computer overriding the will of the pilot.

I'll just leave this here. Fatal Events Involving NASA Astronauts

How about this? Can we agree that the airlines have made seat sizes too small when the cramped spaces begin injuring their passengers? Can we agree that the airlines have made seat sizes too small when they begin killing 300 passengers a year?

Now google DVT for me.

They have policies for both advance notice and missed flights.
They also have policies for connections, customs, linked flights and late cancelations which are under 1hr for most.

From: http://www.airsafe.com/complain/bumping.htm

Overbooking and Involuntary Bumping on U.S. Airlines
U.S. airlines are allowed to overbook flights to allow for "no-show" passengers. However, if passengers are involuntarily bumped, airlines are required to do ask for volunteers to give up their seats in exchange for compensation. Most involuntarily bumped passengers are subject to the following minimum compensation schedule:

-There is no compensation if alternative transportation gets the passenger to the destination within one hour of the original scheduled arrival.

-The equivalent of the passenger's one way fare up to a maximum of $400 for substitute domestic flights that arrive between one and two hours after the original scheduled arrival time or for substitute international flights that arrive between one and four hours after the original scheduled arrival time.

-If the substitute transportation is scheduled to get you to your destination more than two hours later (four hours internationally), or if the airline does not make any substitute travel arrangements for you, the compensation doubles to a maximum of $800.

So the most they would have to pay (in money not PR) would be $800. Even if your ticket was $2000 they are only required to refund you $800.
They also have sections for voluntary bumping but it's pretty much between you and the airline and not a regulation.

They would most likely try and go out of their way to keep you happy but allowing the situation to begin with is a bet against people using their services 100%
Sometimes I'm sure they lose out to keep some customers happy but it's not the same as honoring the purchase of a flight when it's advertised at a certain price for a certain time. Small print notwithstanding.

Yeah, that would be usefully true if jetliners had a decent glide ratio. as it is, once the engines cut out, they fall out of the skies like stones.

You've just won the award for the most idiotic comment of the day. Congrats!

Here's 12 incidents of jets losing all engine power and gliding to a landing. Several with no serious injuries to passengers or crew. That's one hell of a flying rock there.

http://www.airsafe.com/events/noengine.htm

Your argument about power plant safety is silly. Power plants degrade with time. Failing to do things to ensure their safety will result in catastrophic failure. The only question is when it will occur, and those numbers are easily obtained. You can thus trivially calculate the number of people who will die and at what rate if power plants are not maintained. The fact that we have not had deaths due to that cause, then, can clearly be attributed to safety measures. This is not true for terrorism. Indeed, since the goal of terrorism is to create an atmosphere of fear, the paranoia resulting from September 11th has done far more to promote their goals than a subsequent attack could ever have done, and thus, there's no reason to believe that they have made any serious attempts at subsequent attacks. Thus, there is no real indication that the latest security measures have prevented any terrorism in the U.S. at all.

Your argument about airline safety is flawed for precisely the same reason. We've seen firsthand what happens when you don't maintain aircraft, both in cheap U.S. airlines and in foreign airlines. Oh, and you're also wrong. The latest major commercial airline crash in the U.S. was just a little over a year ago: Delta/Comair flight 5191. There was a significant American Airlines crash in New York in November of 2001. In fact, here are a few recent ones. The last one caused by equipment failure on a major carrier was Southwest in December of 2005. Not all of these events cause fatalities, of course; that's more a matter of the specific nature of the failure and when the failure occurs during flight.

The CDC spends a small fortune on studying communicable diseases like smallpox, true, but not for the reasons you imply. It isn't to prevent smallpox. Indeed, we have just declared it to no longer be "in the wild" in 1980. While we're fairly sure it won't come back, we can't be absolutely certain, so it makes sense to continue at least a little bit of research. It also makes sense to do so simply because it is a communicable disease and can teach us stuff about other communicable diseases. That said, the primary purpose of the research is not to prevent deaths. It is to learn about what made those diseases so deadly so that we can better protect ourselves from future diseases that may use some of the same mechanisms. There's a very good scientific rationale for the study of those diseases.

I do agree with you on the nuclear detection issue, though. It's strictly a financial expense without any impact on the public as a whole, it is a relatively small expense with other scientific uses, and it has some slim possibility of actually increasing safety (unlike the asinine policies that seem primarily intended to force people to buy water bottles inside $3 in the airport instead of at $0.33 at the grocery store). Mainly, though, this is a good investment not because of its potential to combat terrorism, but rather in spite of it. There are many good reasons for this research, and terrorism is about the least important of the bunch. It is kind of nice that it serves that ancillary purpose. However, if serving that anti-terrorism purpose doubled the cost of the research, it would probably be pretty foolish, as other means of detecting nuclear material would likely be more practical and economical at that point.

There is a significant chance of that happening, though. This site has a look at 164 crashes with fatalities in the US from 1978 to 1995: http://www.airsafe.com/ten_faq.htm

In 68 cases all passengers died, in 15 cases >90% of passengers died and in 37 cases 10% of passengers died. So given that a lot of crashes are survivable, it's relevant that people don't get knocked out by poisonous fumes when leaving the wreck.

Why? Apart from the low accident rates on airplanes in the first place, you are flying a specific model - some models from Airbus (e.g. A340) have way better records than some from Boeing (e.g. 747), and vice versa. (Source: http://www.airsafe.com/events/models/rate_mod.htm )

Apart from airplane models, crew and maintenance play a big role, too. It would make more sense to look at the records for airlines, since those by necessity combine all of three factors.

You are thinking that falling will cause low gravity and that can be sensed. However if you are also moving in a spiral the centrifugal force will compensate, and that's how you can fly into the ground without knowing it. Basically, all you can sense is the direction of the acceleration vector, but if it points downward it doesn't at all mean you are safe. If you follow the link above you will see that the spiral dive is specifically characterized by the acceleration (gravity + spin) vector being normal to the floor of the cabin, and the only hint you have (outside of the artificial horizon in front of your nose being tilted out of wazoo) is that this "gravity" may be somewhat stronger or weaker - which could also happen as you ascend or descend.

While I do not have on hand statistics for luggage theft for the past several years

This site says the chance of getting hit by luggage theft is 2% on a round-trip.

The same site also advises you to

...Put valuables and critical items in your carry-on bags...

Oh-my...

"Data" is not the plural of "anecdote". Some of the things the submitter was talking about are obviously personal observations, but he was probably referring to stuff like decreasing legroom.

Apparently, the statistics for lost/stolen luggage is about 2%. Doesn't sound like much, but consider that this means that on a flight of a hundred people, two will probably have their luggage lost. Also, this means that you will likely have your luggage lost or stolen once every fifty times you fly... not an issue for me, but my dad travels frequently on business.

Looks like you're right about the prices being lower than in a while, though, according to this. I wouldn't know; I haven't flown in a while.

It's the security thing that's most worrisome to me, though. From what I heard in the other thread, people weren't allowed carry-ons, laptops or other electronics, even books. Considering other changes in aviation security in the past (metal detectors, shoes, explosive sniffers) this may become the norm rather than a temporary measure. I don't know about everyone else here, but to me a six-hour flight (hell, even a two-hour flight) would be intolerable without some of those distractions. I'd rather take the train, but this obviously isn't an option for going to Europe.

Here are some statistics that vary violently from Boeing's. (These statistics are for fatal event rate not hull loss, perhaps hull loss is Boeing's strongest category)

The pilot was doing a low pass for an air show, gave the engines throttle, and the computer on the Airbus 320 decided "no".

According to the Wiki article you linked to, it doesn't specify that "the computer decided 'no'," but rather it indicates that Airbus released a service bulletin alerting of anomolous behaviour with the engines. It could easily have been mechanical. Furthermore, turbofan engines such as those used on jet airplanes do not spool up to full power instantaneously like internal combustion engines. They require a few seconds to smoothly get up to speed and begin producing thrust.

The pilot should ALWAYS be free to override systems, and you should have a really, really, really REALLY good reason for putting any logic into control systems.

The pilots of American Airlines Flight 587 might disagree with you, if they'd survived the crash. The pilots commanded an excessive degree of rudder input while experiencing wake turbulence, which overstressed the airframe and caused a portion of the tail section to break free. If the computers had been allowed to override the pilots' input, it may have prevented the overstressing of the airframe, and while the passengers may have been tossed around a little bit more, the rudder would not have broken off, and the plane could have escaped the turbulence.

there is a BIG red button on the control yolk that

They're not flying an egg. It's a "yoke."

We also have a huge, peer-reviewed system for continuously training pilots in all aspects of flying; pilot's associations, company training and bulletins on safety, procedures, etc in most airlines, and word of mouth.

I assume you're referring to professional, commercial carrier pilots. There certainly is no such "continuous training program" for private pilots. Only some lax currency requirements.

Sorry , here it is again...

http://www.airsafe.com/events/models/rate_mod.htm

This site gives pretty good statistics..

http://www.airsafe.com/events/models/rate_mod.htm/

Considering NASA's safety records (http://www.airsafe.com/events/space/astrofat.htm) , maybe they should copy someone else's software.

Let's see. The page you linked to lists eleven incidents, eight of which are completely unrelated to space flight and space vehicles. The unrelated incidents include things like automobile accidents, a commercial airliner crash, a vintage airplane crash while practicing for an air show, and the crash of a stunt plane.

That leaves the Apollo I training fire and the two shuttles out of--how many manned flights? I haven't done the math, but it's starting to sound safer than automobile travel and downhill skiing. Whose software were you going to suggest?

Considering NASA's safety records (http://www.airsafe.com/events/space/astrofat.htm) , maybe they should copy someone else's software. Then again, 26 people to the Chinese is like 1/100th of an American.

-Ming

On a typical two-lane road, you have a corridor around 12-15 feet wide to maneuver in; in the air, your maneuvering room extends several thousand feet over the entire surface of the earth. Do you really think that accidents are going to be a problem?

If trained and certified pilots can get into midair collisions, I think it would be safe to say that most Joe Autodrivers don't really stand a chance.

In the 747 cargo hatch-blowout (#17 on the list at http://www.airsafe.com/events/models/boeing.htm), which caused the death of 9 people, who just fell or were sucked out of the plane, also the oxygen system was damaged.

So besides as having a 20-40 square foot hole in the right side of the plane, the pilots ( and the passangers ) had no oxygen either!

In this case the lucky thing was probably, that the plane had not reached it's full flying altitude quite yet and they were saved by immediate steep dive.

The crash landing of a Varig 707 in 1973 was due to a fire probably started in the aft lavatory by a cigarette. 123 people died.

See

here, here, and here

(Scroll down or search for cigarette on the latter page).

http://www.airsafe.com/events/space/astrofat.htm/
For starters but with regard to the 27 January 1967 entry. That accident was due to poor work on that unit.
http://www.iasa.com.au/folders/Safety_Issues/RiskM anagement/shuttleContractorsUnderScrutiny.html/
http://www.floridatoday.com/columbia/113003columbi a.htm/
That was within 2 mins of googling. My bad for thinking it was common knowledge

http://www.airsafe.com/stewart.htm

Sorry. I forgot to include the tags.

Try this link.

You're right - the `Die-By-Wire' sytem is probably behind the Airbus 320 family's terrible accident record relative to other aircraft. Oh, wait...

Neither is it rare enough, hence the coinage of the term "air rage".

• Fatal 737 crashes - 52
• Fatal 747 crashes - 27
• Fatal 757 crashes - 8
• Fatal 767 crashes - 6
• Fatal 777 crashes - 0
• Fatal A300 crashes - 9
• Fatal A310 crashes - 5
• Fatal A320 crashes - 5
• Fatal A330 crashes - 0
• Fatal A340 crashes - 0

We. Are. In. Space. Already.

Right now as I type, and then as you read, we are traveling through space on a large (by our standards not the Universe's) rock. Stepping outside this rock's thin layer of atmosphere to get a better look at the stars is a matter better suited for a space based telescope. Sure, I like to experience extended periods of weighlessness and look at the stars from a little more clear perspective, but I wouldn't want to travel in a manner which is less safe than the Shuttle (about a 1-in-56 chance of dying). Your benifit/risk analysis may be more liberal, but really you'd go to a certain death for one minute in Low Earth Orbit, really. On related matter, I don't think that we'll ever see colonization of space (other than the occasional oddball), the cost of maintaining life there is too high, and will likely remain so through our lifetimes.

I think you might mean Payne Stewart.

Unless of course you were talking about this ill-fated Patrick Stewart excursion...

I don't know about the 777, but the Tu124, DC8, DC9, 707, 737, 767, MD81 and A330 seem to be able to make
unpowered landings. That's not on paper, either ;)

Yes, Air marshals do have "magic bullets".

They are called Glaser (sp?) Safety Slugs. They are the handgun equivilent of a shotgun shell with SSG (#8). They have considerable stopping power but prevent serious damage from occuring to the skin and window of the aircraft in the event of a miss. They also eliminate the occurence of the ordinance passing throught the vicitm (as many 9MM slugs would do when encountering human soft tissue at close range).

The danger in a bullet penetrating the skin of the aircraft is not that passengers are being sucked out, is that rapid depreasurization at high altitude can cause structural failure of the aircraft, total incapacitation of the passengers AND crew (including death).

Remember Payne Stewart? His death, and that of all the others on board his aircraft was caused by rapid depressuization.

From http://www.airsafe.com/stewart.htm

"U.S. Air Force pilots reported that the cockpit windows were obscured by frost. The conditions of the windows are consistent with a loss of pressurization and a subsequent rapid drop of temperature. It is likely that the pilots and occupants may have lost consciousness due to hypoxia, or a lack of oxygen. Between the last communication between the aircraft and air traffic control and the aircraft's final descent, the aircraft was reportedly flying as high as 45,000 feet." (emphasis mine)

Now, perhaps you'd like to reconsider you rant, and implied position that having guns on an aircraft is a good thing...

Exactly what is the body count on both sides?

Good question, and one that's hard to answer.

Short answer: the US has lost more astronauts during space missions than the USSR/Russia. According to an airsafe.com article the Soviets lost 4 cosmonauts during space missions. The U.S. lost 7 on Challenger in 1986 and 7 on Columbia (although not all Columbia crewmembers were American).

If you expand the scope of the question to include ground-based deaths in the space and rocketry programs of the U.S. and the USSR then the numbers change dramatically.

The U.S. lost 3 astronauts early in the Apollo program due to a fire in their cabin. The Soviets had a string of ground-based disasters. In 1980 a Vostok rocket exploded on launch, killing 48 people. An even more dramatic failure (cloaked in secrecy for many years) was the October 1960 Nedelin Disaster as part of the Soviet Union's ICBM development program. At least 92 personnel died in the explosion of the R-16 on the launchpad.

Nope.. the Soyuz has had two accidents with casualties, Soyuz 1 and Soyuz 11. In fact its safety record is about the same as the shuttle. link

Never said I hated them. On the contrary, as people, they are fun to hang out with.

But I don't want them building any rockets/planes/automobiles I might ever use someday.

Being a nice person, or enjoyable company, doesn't make one a good engineer. I'll gladly go drinking with a Brazilian, but if I'm going to be launched into space, I want a German/Russian/Japanese/American designed craft, NOT one from a Da Silva.

Fuck man, the Embraer Bandeirante has THE HIGHEST crash rate of ANY commercial jetliner IN HISTORY!(Concorde factored out)

Designed by who? BRAZILIANS! Built by who? BRAZILIANS!

But no, it's just a fluke, right? Brazilian mentatlity couldn't have ANYTHING to do with this, right?

I'll sip a caipirinha anyday, but I wouldn't set foot on an Embraer.

Now go ahead and deny the FACTS. Brazilians are GREAT at that.

I was going to make an argument about vehicle age, but I ran out of patience. Here's some facts I've been able to glean:

For each aircraft model in commercial use in the USA, the FAA reports average ages. There are 85 different models reported, with an average (design) age of 23.5 years (not weighted by count of planes). Another site on airline safety (with counts of planes, year 2002) puts a weighted (by total planes) average of the top 14 carriers at 11.7 years. A rough guess from this is that 75% of the entire fleet is less than 13 years old (1989 with respect to the survey).

In 2001, the Department of Transportation conducted a National Household Travel Survey , which has an online query engine attached to it. From that data, I was able to find that of the reported 196.5 million cars in the USA (that the owners know the date of ownership), 75% of all cars driven in 2001 were built after 1990 (the 11 years matching the planes). 50% of all cars in use were built after 1995.

This matches fairly well with the age of planes in use, therefore age alone is not a factor. But then again, we should know that, because a plane has many different design considerations than an average car.

Incidentally, a brief history of the cellphone lists that it wasn't until 1987 that the FCC opened up the 800MHz band to digital cell phone research. Standards weren't complete until 1991, and digital PCS bandwidth was officially reserved in 1994.

You could argue that planes & cars built before that date could not take cell phone use into account. However, my gut tells me that it is the chassis of each vehicle that is the restriction... because planes are designed to be airtight, they tend to also be signal-tight Farraday cages, trapping EM inside. Secondly, cars are mostly hollow frames covered with plates and have fewer distributed sensor arrays that are critical to operation.

Airbuses glide too: link - landed at night as well.

There are no backups for multiple engine failure on any dual-engine airliner - one engine backs up the other, and that's it. Having a backup engine wouldn't help anyway if you've run out of fuel, which (believe it or not) is the main cause of all-engines-fail on big airliners (and it isn't considered near-impossible, there are many documented occurences).

...my life is more important than YOUR DATA, in *EVERY* case.

Oh, that's right, planes never crash.

With the Paris crash, Concorde went from having a perfect safety record to being four times more dangerous than any other passenger aircraft.

If someone passes out while flying a plane, the Air Force is quite willing to blow him up if it wanders near a populated area. Fighter jets with missiles ready were following Payne Stewart until he crashed, ready to protect Kansas City from his aerial assault.

(The CONUS air control still has negligible ability to locate a lost plane, but if they were to find one, there'd be little compunction about shooting down an unresponsive craft that's aiming at something expensive)

Canada is rated Category 1 (meeting ICAO standards) in FAA's International Aviation Safety Assessment Program (IASA). Air Canada, the biggest airline in Canada, last had a fatal accident in 1983, but it was in Cincinati, Ohio. The last accident in Canada was in 1978. Air Transit, and WestJet have never had a fatal accident. Canada 3000, and Roots Air, which both went defunct last year, never had a fatality in their operating lifetimes either. I can't think of another Canadian Airline.