by Connor Parks
I never thought it would happen again either.
Fifteen going on sixteen years since anything even remotely similar happened in the U.S, the global “gold standard” for flight safety. Sure, at times we had a stray incident with injuries or a sole fatality, but we had attained brilliance unheard of. One of the world’s most historically spotless records of fatality-free commercial aviation, all brought to a jarring halt one January evening in the nation’s capital. A regional jet full of travellers, a helicopter on a routine training mission, and a few seconds of confusion which led to an unfathomable catastrophe.
I can’t help but keep on considering all the strange little connections that keep PSA Flight 5342 and its devastating legacy so fresh in my mind each day. I flew one of PSA’s CRJ-900s (a nearly identical, extended version of the same jet) from Dallas to my hometown airport with a D.C.-based crew on the Saturday night just 4 days before the accident. God only knows why, but I took a throwaway video of our boring, routine landing that I can’t stop watching. I’ve measured where we were at around the height at which the collision occurred, seeing just how long it took for us to touch down; for me to breathe easy and text my anxiously awaiting family that I had finally returned home. Eighteen seconds. Eighteen seconds at the end of a late-night connecting flight, like millions which have passed without event for everyone who’s flown these legs in recent memory. Eighteen seconds, however, lost in time to the 67 souls lost in the recent D.C. collision. Watching the events unfold on cable news on the night of my 20th birthday was a surreal, cathartic experience I hope to never repeat. It was a night which, as I’ve witnessed firsthand, ignited a newfound terror in many who had never considered that such a disaster was still even possible.
There’s a lot of fear circulating right now; a lot of totally understandable, rational, and sensible fear which unfortunately makes sense. Media circulation has latched onto any and every plane-related incident since the D.C. collision. This has only exacerbated the issue and brought more everyday non-issues into public consciousness. Even during my time writing this article, the catastrophic flip-over accident of Delta Connection Flight 4819 in Toronto (fortunately with no fatalities) refreshed a whole new media cycle of “terror in the skies”– the very last thing the industry needed during a time of such uncertainty and unrest. I’d like to sincerely wish all those affected by that accident a speedy recovery and ease of mind going forward. Fortunately, though, we have endless resources to address this fear and these issues on multiple levels, from government agencies hard at work, to raw data on plane crash statistics, to personal coping mechanisms and support groups.
This is a moment with a before and an after, an after in which we’ve found ourselves confronting a mountain of difficult questions. What precedence should priority helicopter corridors have in tight flying areas, especially so close to major civil airports? What level of “bad data” is acceptable on flight instruments in aircraft frequently used to train? How do we increase staffing in already-stressed control towers? How do we ensure every American feels safe flying again? Certainly, the National Transportation Safety Board is hard at work with each aspect of the PSA crash and others, piecing together a second-by-second analysis of everything that went wrong, and everything to change going forward. Their straightforward and trustworthy nature cannot be understated, and the job they’ve been doing has been nothing short of brilliant.
Additionally, and very importantly, the point must be made that none of the incidents that have occurred recently are connected in any way whatsoever. Taking data from the Aviation Safety Network into account, planes of all s shapes and sizes face minor to major incidents at a rate of about seven per day worldwide in recent weeks.
This ranges from everything from an uneventful system failure, to a light plane crashing with injuries, to larger crashes like those we’ve seen in D.C, Toronto, and South Korea in recent months. The latter of these types of incidents are much rarer, occurring at a fractional rate each year but gaining greater media coverage due to their rarity and graphic nature. Of course, once one goes down, every minor unrelated incident which ensues is mapped onto a nonexistent “pattern” by the powers that be, and it appears we’ve found ourselves in one of these pattern-based cycles in recent weeks. The balance between informing and provoking can be difficult to discern, but I hope to provide some context and a broader picture here that both reassures and clarifies. The skies truly are safer than ever, and the data poses this with pride.
Our world is unpredictable, but for those of you still worried about buying tickets for your next voyage, I promise there’s reason to be confident in the state of air travel. If one thing’s for certain, it’s that commercial aviation is statistically the safest mode of public transport out there, and always has been. Flying puts you in the most skilled hands transportation has to offer, from world class pilots and cabin crew at any airline, to planes designed to withstand almost any odds. An MIT statistician recently (and comfortingly) put one’s risk of dying in a commercial plane crash at “only about 1/38th as likely…compared to the levels of the late 1960s and 1970s,” and these numbers have improved drastically even since the mid-2000s. What can’t be done, though, is treating a newfound fear of flying like an irrational worry. I want to emphasise that it’s ok to feel this way, to feel any way at all. If these worries face you, treat them if you can as a sign of curiosity before using your support mechanisms and this information to get you safely to your destination. If a friend or family member faces these fears, remind them to use personal mindfulness tactics throughout their travels (breathing exercises, reassuring mantras, and/or personal calming strategies), as well as checking in on them by text or call as they’re in the airport or in the air if possible. Data can be reaffirming and provide comfort, but we all have ways of managing trauma and anxiety which are unique to us and serve us best. I can’t tell you what that is for you, but I can tell you that regardless of anything, you’re still safer flying now than at any point in history.
I know this is just a college op-ed piece, but I’d like to dedicate it to everyone impacted by this small spate of recent events. To the victims and families of the D.C. midair and other recent air disasters, I hope firstly for peace, and secondly for lasting systemic change to ensure such tragedies never occur again. To all 80 survivors from the Toronto accident, my sentiments expressed earlier resound: I wish for mental and physical healing which lasts. And to you: who may be suffering from a fear of flying, or knows someone who may, I dedicate this all. We all have our burdens to bear, yet I assure you this one will be impermanent, and I wish for comfort, calm, and clear skies as you scan your next boarding pass and embark to wherever the skies may take you 🙂