Are planes crashing more often?

After a series of high-profile disasters, some social media users suggested that air travel accidents were becoming more frequent. Videos of hair-raising near misses began to trend online and the US Transport Secretary Sean Duffy sought to calm fears in an interview with the BBC's US partner, CBS News. He told viewers that the recent spate of air disasters in America were "very unique". Duffy's intervention came after several serious incidents, including a mid-air collision in January between a commercial airliner and a military helicopter in Washington DC, in which 67 people died. Footage of a plane flipping over after landing in poor weather in Toronto, Canada, has also been widely shared online, further fuelling alarm. And while polling on the subject is limited, one recent Associated Press survey suggested these startling images of accidents have had some impact on some US consumers' confidence in flying. But BBC Verify has analysed data in the US and worldwide and found that over the past two decades there has been a general downward trend in air accidents. For the US, figures on air accidents have been compiled by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) up to the end of January this year. This NTSB data shows a general fall in air accidents in the US from 2005 to 2024 despite a significant increase in the overall number of flights over this period. It also shows that the figure for January 2025 (52), was lower than it was in January last year (58) and January 2023 (70). Data from International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO), a UN body which monitors global air incidents, shows that the number of worldwide accidents per million plane departures has also seen a clear downward trend between 2005 and 2023.<br/>