What It Takes to Make Flying Safe

Near misses and accidents have to do with the whole system of aviation management.

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Wednesday night’s deadly airplane crash was tragic—and, to many experts, not altogether surprising. The collision between a commercial airplane and a military helicopter in Washington, D.C., has led many people to take a closer look at the complex systems that commercial flying relies on, and the strain that some of those systems are under. I spoke with my colleague Ian Bogost, who writes often about the airline industry, about the factors that shape our perceptions of flying.

Lora Kelley: This incident is not an aberration, but rather something experts seem to have seen coming. What were some of the warning signs?

Ian Bogost: Aviation experts had been fearing that something like this would happen not just at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, but all across the country. Near misses have been on the rise, as have “runway incursions”—planes accidentally sharing the same space with other planes. I won’t pretend to understand all of the reasons for that—and that’s part of the problem. The issues here aren’t as simple as something like screws falling off. Rather, near misses and accidents have to do with the whole system of aviation management: pilot experience; air-traffic-control staffing; the number of planes in the air; the complex airspace around Washington, D.C., in this case. More Americans are flying too, and growing demand puts new pressure on all of these systems in invisible ways.

Lora: How should people think about flying at this moment?

Ian: Commercial airlines want you to feel comfortable flying, because their business depends on it. The evolution of commercial air travel, especially in America, has made it so you don’t even have to look at or smell or hear the equipment to the same extent that passengers once did. You’re protected from many things that remind you that you’re in a machine hurtling through the air at 500 miles per hour.

Commercial air travel really is quite safe. When I say commercial air travel, I mean when you fly a major carrier on a scheduled flight that’s regulated. Safety in the cabin has also improved. Flight attendants worked very hard over many decades to establish themselves as safety professionals and not just service staff. The flight crew is trained to act in case of an emergency, and they’re highly prepared to do so. But because travel is so safe, you never get to see them perform that expertise—God forbid you see them perform that expertise.

Lora: Airlines are quite consolidated, and the system of flight relies on a range of factors beyond just individual companies. How does consolidation factor into safety?

Ian: We have fewer choices in flight than we used to—fewer airlines, fewer routes, fewer airport hubs. That does have an impact on safety. One way this plays out is, if you have fewer options for direct flights, you might have to opt for a layover. Takeoffs and landings are the most dangerous part of air travel. So if you can reduce takeoffs and landings—for example, by taking one flight instead of two—you’re safer, at least statistically. This is all still safer than driving somewhere in a car.

It’s really difficult for consumers to make rational decisions about safety today. Especially because we don’t really know what happened yet with this incident, we don’t know how great the risk is of it happening again. I’ve heard people start to consider making changes to their habits, although I don’t think we’re going to see many folks change their plans in the long run. After a door plug blew off during an Alaska Airlines flight last year, I started to see people saying they would try to avoid the aircraft in question, a Boeing 737-9 MAX. Are those people actually safer? Who knows.

Lora: Why do people often pin their safety fears on airplanes themselves, rather than focusing on the people or systems that operate them?

Ian: In the case of flying, people tend to target their concern toward the concrete, visceral problems they can see and touch: Is there a screw loose? Is my seat broken? We mostly don’t consider the more systemic, intangible ones, such as staffing issues and maintenance routines and airspace-traffic patterns.

When an accident like this week’s happens, however, we get a brief insight into just how complex modern life is. For all of us, it’s certainly much easier not to have to think about that complexity.

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