Penguins confirm: what doesn’t fly doesn’t crash either

How safe is safe flying?

As I watched the video (someone was up there videoing this crash as it happened …?) of flight 7C2216’s final moments before disaster struck—or, rather, it struck disaster—it did occur to me to think that the brick wall built across the end of the runway was awfully close … to the end of the runway. Now, it’s been announced that that, while not quite true, is getting there: it was potentially built awfully close to the end of the runway. Whether the imperilled machine would have been saved by the 90 metres’ extra room mandated by the International Civil Aviation Organization, or the 240 metres’ extra room that that organisation recommends (by which one must ponder what the safety consideration exactly is between mandating and recommending a safety feature) is nonetheless a question fit for the but for rule, which I expounded upon recently. She was going at a heck of a lick, as they say in Yorkshire.

Mr Choi Sang-mok has urged that “even before the final results are out, we ask that officials transparently disclose the accident investigation process and promptly inform the bereaved families.” You may also recall me having mentioned what governments mean when they speak about the bereaved. Of course, they do mean the bereaved, but only incidentally. The word transparency struck my eye and, I admit, evoked a laugh. Well, in this case the video evidence is fairly bleak. We know what caused the disaster; but we’re far from knowing what set it off. The requested transparency will depend on how knowable—in terms of secrecy—the cause of the accident was. Sorry, the potential cause of the accident.

Mr Choi Sang-mok is the acting replacement of acting president Han Duck-soo, who was filling the post of president of South Korea further to the declaration of martial law in that country by (and the subsequent deposing of) then-President Yoon Suk Yeol. Choi is the acting acting president, further to the ignominious removals from office of his two predecessors. I think that, in that fact alone, we may somewhere have at least the initial green roots of the cause, the potential cause, of this disaster: nothing in Korea gets done until it’s in someone’s financial interest to do it. Of course, things may be different round your way.

I haven’t flown for ages. Not since 2018. And I wonder whether I will ever fly in an aircraft again. There are a number of reasons.

Flying is relatively safe compared to land transport. The rate of deaths on the Belgian roads has fallen sharply in recent years, possibly as a result of heightened driver awareness of such dangers as black ice, fog, sudden stoppages on busy roads (keeping their distance), awareness for motorcycles and less chance taking. Perhaps because people don’t drive any more at all—it’s a drag, especially finding parking, driving 30 kph on city roads, constantly watching for speed traps, and tax, tax, tax. Still, around 400 people die a year in accidents on our roads. In India, around 450 people die on the railways per day who are not passengers: they are hit walking alongside the railway, or when crossing in front of trains, or in some other manner. Four hundred and fifty a day. India is a large country, and Belgium is small.

Aviation trainer and pilot Petter Hörnfeldt runs a number of YouTube channels in which he reports and comments on developments in the airline industry and also on disasters, both contemporary and historic. He recently issued a Christmas greeting to his followers and mentions in that message that he is reassured by feedback from his subscribers that those among them who fly professionally now fly more safely thanks to his videos and those who fly as passengers fly with greater reassurance, for the same reason.

I have no criticism of Mr Hörnfeldt (except it be for the X in Xmas). I find his broadcasts entertaining, thoughtful, a tad on the technical side, but heartfelt. He really cares about his industry. The question that always remains in my mind when his videos conclude is whether his industry really cares about me.

One reason I don’t fly any more is because I once attended an Aerosmith concert. It was the first time I had the distinct feeling of being handled like cattle. The last time I attempted to fly was in 2020. I bought a ticket to fly to Spain for 150 euros and, when I arrived at the airport, was told I needed to pay an additional 55 euros to check in. I found the surcharge outrageous, for people who were already employed to stand there to check people in and thus simply do their job. So I baulked and walked out of the airport and drove home. Upon entering the house I had a feeling that all was well and as it should be, by not having flown to Spain. Two weeks later, a pandemic broke out … in Spain.

Aircraft depend for their safe flying on a number of systems, and redundancies for the event that any one of these systems breaks down. The tragic events occurring at Muan and Aktau over the past few days may be due to circumstances outside the control of those piloting the aircraft in question. Nevertheless, the death toll from these two incidents is 217 souls; some speculate that the events in Grozny that prevented the Azerbaijani aircraft from landing there mask authorities’ intention, which was that, once (erroneously) attacked, the aircraft would disappear into the depths of the Caspian Sea (which would possibly have saved Mr Putin his apology) rather than surviving to crash on land on the other shore. In Muan, the speculation is that birds downed the aircraft, preventing its wheels from dropping to allow a safe landing. Clearly, the dangers that present themselves to aircraft lie not only within the systems by which they operate.

But the dangers that aircraft present do not only consist of falling out of the sky. It is the pollutants they produce, which fall out of the sky behind them, that also present a danger and it is this aspect of aviation that Mr Hörnfeldt seems less able to give an answer to, for you don’t need to be an aircraft operative or an aircraft passenger to fall victim to those dangers. And they exist whether the aircraft malfunctions or not.

When a decision is made to travel by air, the factors that play a role are first and foremost the price of the ticket (and of any hidden surcharges that creep into the final bill—like taking your luggage with you). Then there is the convenience of the airport from which you wish to travel, and the convenience of that for which you are destined with respect to your final destination. These are all factors that lie within the domain of convenience: above all, flying must be convenient. Even if there is much security and surveillance rigmarole associated with travelling by air that ventures far from the path of what one might consider convenience: people love flying for a convenience that will be the death of us. Don’t forget (as I now know), these are cash-driven cattle-herding techniques …

However, whether the aeroplane is likely to crash or not will probably be the last thing on your mind (or, in the case of Dustin Hoffman’s Raymond Babbitt in Rain Man, the first). Which is interesting, because if you travel on the road from La Paz to Las Yungas in Bolivia, dying is the first thing that concerns you. Convenience and speed are the last things on your mind. Just being alive when the journey ends is the prime concern. Of such concern is the possibility of dying on Bolivia’s main roads that, quite honestly, Bolivians prefer to stay at home if they possibly can, rather than venturing out onto the country’s highways, so dangerous are they. And if staying at home is not an option, boy, do they take precautions. The roads are liable to landslips, avalanches, and vehicular accident, entrenched in red mud, with swept-away bridges, crossing treacherous mountain tops, infested with poisonous snakes and spiders. They travel the highways of Bolivia who must. And they travel the bargain airlines of the world who can. And they can who have very little wherewithal.

Image: lorry accident on the La Paz-Las Yungas road in Bolivia

On the road from Las Yungas to the capital, La Paz, the most dangerous portion starts with an open area where vehicles can stop and lay a tribute at a shrine and say prayers for the passage down the mountain. Bolivians can be deeply spiritual people, especially given the treacherous landscape within which many of them live and cope from day to day. In Bolivia, danger is a relative concept, just as it is everywhere else in the world. To some, the dangers of flying are so present that they baulk at it, like me. We prefer to remain with our feet on the ground and, in that state, in Belgium at least, there is always a danger that I could be one of the 400 people who will die on our roads this year. In India, a similar chance exists of perishing on a railway in one day. So, danger, or potential danger, really is relative.

These are the kinds of dangers that circumstance will impose on me if I venture forth from my own little homestead. But there are also dangers that the modes of transport that I eschew by staying in my homestead will nonetheless pose for me, even if I venture nowhere. It is the risk factor that exists in every risk assessment and risk negotiation, which will have no part to play in the resulting decision—the danger to others. For a shocking example of ignoring the risk posed to an outside third party, read the following article.

Aircraft emissions will foul my air. And there will be more emissions the more people travel by air. Mr Hörnfeldt says in one of his videos that the cost of flying transatlantic in the 1960s was about 500 dollars, a sum that was imposed by government regulation. The airlines were far more regulated then than they are now. In today’s money, that would make the cost of a flight from New York to London and back around 4,000 dollars. Nowadays, the average workforce member takes three flying vacations a year, and for far less than 4,000 dollars.

This is a conundrum that some European resorts are now having to battle with. Places like Málaga, Barcelona, Venice, the Isle of Capri, Sorrento, and so on: having successfully marketed themselves as popular resorts, they now find that the volume of traffic to their attractions is so great that it is posing a problem for the people who live there (not, of course, for the tourists who visit there, who expect to be herded like cattle). Tourism used to be seasonal, but so wealthy have some become and so readily available are the cheap flights to and from such destinations, that tourism keeps going full pelt throughout the year. There are obvious advantages for some in this. And, for others, there are obvious disadvantages. Just as there are obvious disadvantages to building a brick wall at the end of an airport runway, except they are only important if an aircraft runs into them. Otherwise, rebuilding them doesn’t fit within the concept of convenience.

Whether by fair means or foul, and whether now or in the past, airlines have benefited from a great deal of subsidy. Subsidy sounds like a cogent part of financial planning, but it is little more than dipping a hand into the pot of tax revenue. Airline subsidies are paid by every relevant taxpayer, regardless of whether they travel by air or not. And, just as the funds to keep airlines afloat (if that isn’t a mixed metaphor) are borne by everybody, so everybody, even those who don’t pay the relevant taxes, must bear the burden of the waste that aircraft produce. And those who benefit from the airlines’ flights do so for the resulting bargain prices.

I doubt many people pay 4,000 dollars to travel from New York to London any more, unless they’re in a business or first class cabin. The question is rather whether everyone shouldn’t be paying 4,000 dollars to cross the Atlantic. They either fly because they must, for business, in which case a business that can afford to send any executive to Europe or America for commercial purposes can as well afford a price ticket of 4,000 dollars as one of 500 dollars. Or they travel because they want to. For leisure or pleasure. And, if that is so, and Zoom really will not do for the occasion, then into their purse they must delve to fulfil their travel dreams. They will be all the more valuable to them for having cost so much, surely. And the realistic pricing of flights would certainly reduce the invasions of tourists to the problem resorts that so want to be rid of them, whose tourists really regard the cost of getting there like the cost of a bus ticket: such is the level of convenience.

The euphemism public convenience means a publicly accessible toilet—there if you need it. On the fly, so to speak. To drop your waste and carry on with life without any further regard for it. Just like flying.

Image: Boeing 737-8AS aircraft operated by Jeju Air Co., Ltd., (by Steven Byles - https://www.flickr.com/photos/sjbyles/51713300354/, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=112959828)