Accident statistics

[John Brandon]

I have completed the annual review of the trend in RA-Aus fatal accidents.

 

See http://flysafe.raa.asn.au/safety/intro2.html#fatal_accidents

 

John Brandon

 

 

[XP503]

Good work John

 

 

[kaz3g]

Good summation of the statistics and the human cost, John. Thank you.

 

kaz

 

 

[planedriver]

Very interesting John, hope everyone on here takes the time to read it.

 

 

[robinsm]

John, your contribution, through these articles, to the safety of recreational pilots is tremendous. I have learned a lot from reading them and then putting your suggestions into my regular flight program. I regularly practice stalls, engine outs and recovery from unusual positions as part of the fun I have when flying. I have had a couple of engine outs and the information from your articles and my practice of your recommendations proved invaluable. I have placed your series on my favourites and essential reference lists.

 

Thank you

 

Maynard Robinson

 

 

[Guest davidh10]

A good article and interesting statistics, as far as they go.

 

The article identifies a number of potentially contributing factors, but unfortunately there are no statistics to indicate the extent to which these factors may contribute to accidents. It would seem to me that graphing fatalities per hundred members per annum is only indicating a very general trend, but not identifying any of the sub-groups or contributing factors.

 

While non-flying members may be involved as a passenger, it is the PIC who is significant in accident cause analysis. Hopefully non-flying members were not included in the accidents per hundred members figures. In addition, pilot members who did not fly during the year could not have had an accident, so also should have been excluded.

 

Surely the accident rate per thousand hours of flying would be a more useful headline statistic?

 

It is disclosed that the average RAA member only flies 35 hours per annum and as that is an average, suggests that low hours per annum may be insufficient to maintain or improve competency, and thus may be a contributory factor to accidents. Every fatal RAA accident is investigated and evry pilot must report, each year, their flying hours (both in the last 12 months and cumulative), so the data must be available, albeit perhaps not in a readily assessable form, to make some useful statistical correlation. What is the accident rate per thousand hours for pilots against number of hours per annum flown? Is there a relationship between accident rate and total pilot flying hours (experience)?

 

In any data set, there will be outliers. We all know there's a percentage, hopefully very small, who are out for a Darwin Award. If an accident pilot can be established to have deliberately and repeatedly flown in a fool hardy manner, then that accident statistic should be separately identified as a behavioural causal factor and quarantined from the analysis statistics. Such accidents do little to usefully inform the majority of pilots, who do not deliberately engage in unsafe behaviour.

 

Are factory built aircraft safer than home built ones? The bare statistics of accidents per type registered ignore the fact than there may be many that are not being flown. Again it is the accident rate per thousand flight hours per type that would be more informative.

 

We believe that most accidents are due to human factors, but where are the statistics that indicate the frequency of each human factors classification as significant causal factors in accidents?

 

Rather than the current very high level, broad brush approach to informing members, some more useful statistics could provide the basis to target the most prevalent causes in a pro-active member education campaign.

 

It is not too late to phone or email your RAA Board Member today to request them to support John McKeown's proposal to improve the accident reporting and analysis information available to all. The RAA Board Meeting is tomorrow (9th Feb, 2012).