From the World’s Deadliest Airline
Aeroflot, founded on this day in 1923, is one of the world’s safest airlines. The website AirlineRatings.com – which judges the vulnerability of carriers according to a number of criteria – gives it the maximum seven stars, placing it alongside the likes of Qantas and BA (and ahead of Ryanair) in its latest ratings. The Russian airline has been involved in just one fatal accident in the past 20 years.
But it wasn’t always thus. Aeroflot’s safety record was once the stuff of nervous fliers’ nightmares – and the numbers are truly staggering.
During 1973 alone, it was involved in 27 incidents in which a total of 780 people lost their lives, according to the Aviation Safety Network.
In 1974, there were another 21, while in 1975 the figure fell to 19. But 1976 was a real annus horribilis, with a total of 33 accidents or major incidents.
In fact, as the graph below shows, barely a Cold War year went by when scores of travellers didn’t spend their final moments strapped into an Aeroflot seat. Its planes fell from the sky with unerring consistency.
That’s a total of 721 incidents in 44 years. Yes, Aeroflot wasn’t the only airline to suffer during the Sixties and Seventies – the deadliest decades for flying. But it was involved in far more than any other.
The Aircraft Crashes Record Office reports 8,231 passengers have died in Aeroflot crashes. Air France is next on its list, with 1,783, followed by Pan Am (1,645), American (1,442), United (1,211) and TWA (1,077).
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