Hudson River Plane Crash

On Thursday January 15, 2009 a US Airways plane crashed into the Hudson River in NY. Thankfully, all passengers survived and many credit the heroic work of the pilot for a great landing and making sure all were safe. While this is a good story out of what could have been a devastating tragedy it raises the question: how safe is air travel? A commonly held theory is that air travel is the safest of all transportation but how do we know? The planes and engines for them are put through rigorous testing before they are ever allowed to take passengers and there is extensive maintenance checking that occurs before flights.

How do we know for a fact that the mechanics have checked everything properly before a plane takes off? How much information does air traffic control have at their disposal when they allow planes to fly through turbulence? The accident in NY seemed to be “freakish” in nature as birds struck the engine but I wonder how was this not tested?

I am nervous about flying and incidents like this do not help, and I am sure the same can be said for others nervous about flying as well.