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Low Cost Flights - are they dangerous?

Tony Lockhart said:
@ariegur

This chart, from Aviation Safety Network, shows no correlation between the boom of the low cost carrier from the 1990s and an increase in casualties.



Now take a look, if you dare, at the risk of becoming a casualty in a car.

On that graph, the 9/11 deaths show as quite a chunk on the 2001 bar. That puts worldwide airline casualties into perspective.

In fact, I'd advise you to not fly at all in an airliner. Hijacking and other terrorist activity might well be a greater risk than pilot error, especially in the Middle East.
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Unfortunately for me, I can't fly in the ME..

Arye
 
Just had a quick look at Flightradar 24. There are numerous 747s en route across the Atlantic to various US cities, including Miami, Chicago, Orlando, Boston etc., airlines are BA, Virgin, KLM and Lufthansa. I've only looked at a few of the hundreds of aircraft currently crossing the Atlantic. Many more in use for cargo.
 
BTC3 said:
I thought 737 was a type rating. Moving from classic to no to max should require a refresher, rather than an entire new rating. Given the number of 737s out there, it would be a poor move from Boeing to require a new rating for the new model...
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I just looked this up, surprisingly little difference between the 737s cockpit across the generations. There are 2 EASA TYPE ratings for 737 the original 100/200 and the rest. Pilots may need "differences" training to fly older or newer types.

It is a bit of a sore point for pilots, they have to use a flight deck basically designed in the 50s.

Airbus cockpits have more modern ergonomics. Manufacturers try to keep differences to a minimum.
 
ariegur said:
Between the lines the channel was trying to suggest that it is better to fly with El Al

Arye
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linnfomaniac83 said:
Yes indeed... I just had that old saying stuck in my mind “any landing that you can walk away from is a good landing”... implying that a bad landing involves flames and a broken fuselage.

I’ve actually been on a flight which ended in a an emergency landing not long after takeoff in 1994, a fully laden 767, it had to dump fuel before it could land and when it did land, it was scary, touchdown was hard, and it seemed to take forever to come to a stop (because it was still heavier than it would normally be). It didn’t put me off flying though, and surprisingly, that 767 took off again the same day. It was a pressurisation issue. I can’t find any record of it but another B767 recently suffered a pressure relief valve failure flying out of London albeit at a higher altitude and had to make an emergency landing, again, the only casualties were passengers underwear.
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I took off from Heathrow about 12 years ago and after a while noticed we were doing a tour of the South Downs for half an hour rather than heading north. The pilot came on with one of those “some of you will have noticed...” announcements. Fortunately the sentence wasn’t finished with “and I have an angry man with a big beard in the cockpit”. He had to slowly dump his fuel before returning to Heathrow for the full Smokey and the Bandit emergency landing.
 
in all the flights i have taken i have experienced two emergencies. Both oddly involved the the same airline.

one involved a landing in a severe storm, where on our 5th attempt to land we were blown off the runway on to the grass surround which was so soft that when the plane came to rest, it sunk into the ground at an angle and we had to disembark via the emergency chutes.

Second occasion same airline, a fire in the galley filled the aircraft with smoke, pilot turned back, dumped fuel, and landed safely at the starting airport, we all disembarked normally.

I have subsequently flown the same airline.

Once had to board and fly in one of the oldest and tatiest 737s you ever did see, on an internal flight in India - which was terrifying as the airline had had one of its other 737s drop out of the sky the day before.......
 
ariegur said:
Between the lines the channel was trying to suggest that it is better to fly with El Al but the question is if what they told about pilots is true, I think that it is.
I think that LCF must announce to public if it is using pilots that are paying in order to work.

Arye
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I guess the difference between El Al and Easyjet (say) is that Easyjet have yet to have a fatal crash and if I were on the one to go down then at least I'd know that I wasn't guaranteed to be sitting next to a racist as I met my doom.
 
The advice used to be only fly with national carriers or, if in Europe and North America, regionals too.

Twenty five years after I first heard that (from a CAA inspector) I'd avoid certain national carriers too. The worldwide economic downturn on top of their own struggles has seen to that.

I've flown in the African bush in tiny puddle jumpers, microlights and helicopters. I felt safest in the microlight as I could see the quality of the workmanship :)
 
This crew were so professional and reassuring, the air went misty, our ears popped, oxygen masks dropped and the plane went from climbing to descending pretty much immediately but there was no real panic. A few worried cries and sighs but the pilot quickly came on the PA to explain the situation and the cabin crew just went about their business helping people. We were probably in the air for another 45 minutes after the decompression, circling at a low altitude, we were given drinks which helped give an extra feeling of calm. As I say, the scariest part was the heavy landing and the length of time it took to slow down. We disembarked via a jet bridge though, the airframe was totally undamaged and just taxied back as normal.
 
I have been on two flights with an engine failure at take off (Gulf Air and Virgin), pressurisation failure (a charter in the 80s)
These were all old aircraft. I have never had a LCA do this, though they do have the odd fault.
When you see a 747 passenger aircraft crossing the Atlantic, you know that it is old.
 
Don't believe any of this lot. Not only are LCA worse, but it is all because of Jeremy Corbyn and members of a radical faction in Labour who are de-selecting any MP who dares raise the safety of LCAs in parliament. Now, you may ask what the people who are actually on power doing about this - BUT NO, NO, NO, DON'T LOOK THERE, LOOK AT ME, LOOK AT ME, LABOUR BIGOTS AND THEY PROBABLY DON'T LIKE DARK SKINNED PEOPLE UNLESS THEY ARE COVERED IN COAL DUST. (Phew, almost lost them there). Yep, there you have it. Not only are LCAs a HUGE risk because of JEREMY CORBYN and a SECRET CABAL of reds under all constituency beds, but as Labour will come to power after letting Brexit happen - we won't even be able to afford to fly on even the low cost ones in our new post-rationalist economy.

And that's the truth. Honest.
 
davidsrsb said:
When you see a 747 passenger aircraft crossing the Atlantic, you know that it is old.
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Not necessarily and in any case.. compared to what? Lufthansa was still buying 747-8s until very recently. 747-400s are no older that 15 years, which isn't especially old for a modern passenger aircraft and no older than many Airbus and other Boeing types.

For those like me who prefer the idea of four engines.. It appears the only current alternative big jets are Airbus A380 ( Up to ten years old) and Airbus A 340 introduced 25 years ago and last built in 2008.

Possibly odd Russian built types too.. but I won't be flyng in any of those.
 
You might want to avoid G-CELH, a Boeing 737 owned by Jet2.

It is 31 years old and this time last year was the oldest aircraft flown by a UK carrier.
 
Bob McC said:
You might want to avoid G-CELH, a Boeing 737 owned by Jet2.

It is 31 years old and this time last year was the oldest aircraft flown by a UK carrier.
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Ouch, smaller aircraft are shorter lived than the long haulers as it is take off and landings that cause the metal fatigue.
 
Sue Pertwee-Tyr said:
Yes in Europe. 300 hours for a newly qualified first officer is, and has always been, permissible. Captains require many more hours, 1500 being the minimum they need to even give them the licence to take command of a passenger aircraft, but typically they’ll have several multiples of that before they get their command, even in a LCA. Sounds like the programme might have been a tad over excited.
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Our younger daughter is a pilot with a small Swiss airline. After the commercial licence and training in the aircraft and in the big simulator centre in Orly, Paris, she started as a junior co-pilot (two stripes). She had to have 1000 hours before she got the third stripe. Captain? At least 4 years away, she tells me.
 
tones said:
Our younger daughter is a pilot with a small Swiss airline. After the commercial licence and training in the aircraft and in the big simulator centre in Orly, Paris, she started as a junior co-pilot (two stripes). She had to have 1000 hours before she got the third stripe. Captain? At least 4 years away, she tells me.
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Good luck to her, would have been my dream job if I hadn’t got prohibitive health problems... and accessible too since my great uncle is, or rather was a flight instructor until he was diagnosed with a heart condition. He’s given up flying now but flew until he was 70.
 
Bob McC said:
You might want to avoid G-CELH, a Boeing 737 owned by Jet2.

It is 31 years old and this time last year was the oldest aircraft flown by a UK carrier.
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Total take off and landing cycles are more important than the actual age in years, as is a solid maintenance schedule. Rest assured that this airframe will have been thoroughly inspected in recent times. It had a major overhaul in 2014, receiving a new interior at the time, this would almost certainly have coincided with a D check where even the tiniest of flaws will have been found and remedied. Also bear in mind, Jet2 have an excellent safety record. It will be one of very few 737-300s still in regular service in this part of the world, I’d actually like to fly on it just because I’m an aviation nerd and it’s been a while since Ive flown on a 737-300.
 
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