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Singapore Airlines Boeing 777
Why you shouldn’t be scared about flying
I have just received a query from an air traveler in my Messenger. She asked whether she should be concerned about flying on her upcoming flight on the Boeing 777 with Singapore Airlines.
This concern probably arose after the crashes on the Boeing 737 MAX on Lion Air and Ethiopian Airlines and the Boeing 737-800 on China Eastern Airlines and recently, the malfunction of the pitot tubes system on a Malaysian Airlines plane (MH2664) which caused it to return to the departure airport.
Well, I can only say that this “wide-body” Boeing 777 is one of the safest twin engine long-haul planes in the world today.
The first plane came into service in 1995. I went to Seattle, USA in 1997 to do the Boeing 777 course and flew on it for about 9 years. I found it to be a very safe and reliable plane before I switched over to fly the Airbus A320/A330/A340 on a different airline.
As of July 2018, there were a total of 1,416 Boeing 777 and its variants flying in various airlines across the world.
The Boeing 777 is known as a “wide-body” aircraft because its body has a width of 20 feet 4 inches. It also has the biggest engines in commercial aviation where one can figuratively drive a car through each of them.
The Boeing 777-300 at 244 feet in length, is 11 feet longer than the Boeing 747-400.
The latest variant, Boeing 777X has a wingspan of 235 feet which would be too big for current airports. As such, the wingtips could be folded up on the ground, reducing the wingspan to 212 feet to enable it to manoeuvre within most international taxiways.
Due to its size, the plane tends to ride better in turbulence. This can be seen on a large cruise liner which will ride the same waves far better than on a smaller boat. Rest assures that your upcoming flight on the Boeing 777 would be a smoother one.
Flying on any airliner, may it be on the Boeing or Airbus planes is one of the safest forms of travelling across the globe.
The annual risk of being involved in an air crash (in America) is about 1 in 11 million. Compare this to the annual risk of being killed on the road, which is 1 in 5000.
However, psychologists have found that when we have total control like when we’re driving, we are less afraid. But we are more scared when we don’t have control of where we are heading to, especially when we are a passenger on a plane.
The more aware of a risk we are, the more concerned we become. So, when there is a plane crash, flying seems scarier to many of us.
People are also more sensitive about catastrophe which kills people all at once. It gets more media attention than, say, heart disease which kills more people at different places each day.
These factors are a few of the reasons why some people tend to be skeptical of the flying safety statistics.
To me, I still feel safer flying to my holiday destinations on the Boeing 777 anytime than taking a car trip to the airport.
View a video on “Why You Shouldn’t Be Scared of Flying” here