Fatal civil airliner accidents by country and region 1945-2022

As a result of the continued annual growth in global air traffic passenger demand, the number of airplanes that were involved in accidents is on the increase. Although the United States is ranked among the 20 countries with the highest quality of air infrastructure, the U.S. reports the highest number of civil airliner accidents worldwide.

2020 was the year with more plane crashes victims, despite fewer flights

The number of people killed in accidents involving large commercial aircraft has risen globally in 2020, even though the number of commercial flights performed last year dropped by 57 percent to 16.4 million. More than half of the total number of deaths were recorded in January 2020, when an Ukrainian plane was shot down in Iranian airspace, a tragedy that killed 176 people. The second fatal incident took place in May, when a Pakistani airliner crashed, killing 97 people.

Changes in aviation safety

In terms of fatal accidents, it seems that aviation safety experienced some decline on a couple of parameters. For example, there were 0.37 jet hull losses per one million flights in 2016. In 2017, passenger flights recorded the safest year in world history, with only 0.11 jet hull losses per one million flights. In 2020, the region with the highest hull loss rate was the Commonwealth of Independent States. These figures do not take into account accidents involving military, training, private, cargo and helicopter flights.