Airline Safety - carriers with poor record

[Foreigner]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/obama-pilot-unsafe-airlines-won-fly-article-1.2215362

Some of these belong to Star Alliance: Turkish and Asiana

 

[boomy]

Sad
These are two airlines who offer very good products and generous award availability.

 

[Boris spatsky]

I agree with the article. Turkish expanding so rapidly that they keep dropping the requirements for pilots to join as they can't get enough; Lionair has a monstrous order book with not enough pilots to fly them all so they are basically giving 737 commands away (to pilots who in some instances should not be in command); Asiana the 'poor cousin' of Korean Air according to friends who have been employed by both airlines. I will be steering clear of all of them as well.

 

[Foreigner]

I agree with the article. Turkish expanding so rapidly that they keep dropping the requirements for pilots to join as they can't get enough; Lionair has a monstrous order book with not enough pilots to fly them all so they are basically giving 737 commands away (to pilots who in some instances should not be in command); Asiana the 'poor cousin' of Korean Air according to friends who have been employed by both airlines. I will be steering clear of all of them as well.

Thai too has had unwanted attention about safety/ maintenance issues.

 

[PaulST]

Thai too has had unwanted attention about safety/ maintenance issues.

I recall the incident in 2013 where an A330 ran off the runway and Thai painted over the logos ASAP. Said a lot about their priorities...
I flew with Dearair in China in December and while the flight went fine, I wouldn't fly with them again (having read more about the swift expansion of many Asian airlines).
Turkish have had their fair share of problems recently with the ?A330/?777 crashing in Nepal and then the A320 last week.

 

[jb747]

Turkish
https://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&...=N_lneIiVkPSM38SX-G40wg&bvm=bv.92885102,d.cGU

Asiana
https://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&...=eFwKLGlXAkOJZjfh7wqHaw&bvm=bv.92885102,d.cGU

Korean
https://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&...=LoTb5BRiwI1EZypiYaw_Zw&bvm=bv.92885102,d.cGU

Thai
Accidents and Incidents

Of the bunch, Asiana scare me. Bloody near ran into my parked 767 one night in Singapore (they almost managed an aircraft on each wing). Don't listen. Don't look. Dangerous in all ways.

 

[Foreigner]

Of the bunch, Asiana scare me. Bloody near ran into my parked 767 one night in Singapore (they almost managed an aircraft on each wing). Don't listen. Don't look. Dangerous in all ways.

Scary indeed. I've had a number of flights with them...syd-icn, icn-lhr, nrt-icn...best avoided.

 

[PaulST]

Scary indeed. I've had a number of flights with them...syd-icn, icn-lhr, nrt-icn...best avoided.

Why do you say that? I almost flew with them on a recent trip to Japan-SK-China but instead flew with QF, CX and Air China (plan to avoid the last one in the future...*)

*due to general unpleasantness of the ground staff and passengers rather than any safety concerns.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Well - garuda ain't on the list... nor are any of the Chinese mainland carriers

I'm surprised however that MH isn't on his list. Just as important as pilot capability is the operations and flight planning in the back office. The corporate culture should equally be focused on safety. Maybe the new CEO of MH will turn to that in due course... but the Commercial Director still leaves MH as a 'do not fly' on my list.

 

[RooFlyer]

Very interesting article and comments here; thanks. I must admit I have taken the fact that an airline is part of a major alliance as a 'tick' if I was otherwise concerned. No longer!

I have a standing instruction to my travel agent of "No flights on Dodgy Air" (ie avoid small, non mainstream airlines) - but I have broken that rule on a few occasions, as there was simply no alternative in cases where I had to go (Air Burkina in to Ouagadougou) , or really wanted to (Lao Air in and out of Pakse).

 

[Boris spatsky]

I have a standing instruction to my travel agent of "No flights on Dodgy Air" (ie avoid small, non mainstream airlines) - but I have broken that rule on a few occasions, as there was simply no alternative in cases where I had to go (Air Burkina in to Ouagadougou) , or really wanted to (Lao Air in and out of Pakse).

Very good friends asked my opinion of Laos Air for a flight Vientiane to Pakse in 2013. I recommended not to fly with them; they ended up booking anyway and were ok. The next week, that exact flight crashed, killing 49. Very lucky.

 

[jb747]

From what I've gathered on this forum and others...people are interested safety until it impacts their wallet. Then they take the cheapest flight.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

From what I've gathered on this forum and others...people are interested safety until it impacts their wallet. Then they take the cheapest flight.

With the exception of QF! People will spend extra to fly QF based on their reputation for safety.

The flip side is MH... cheap fares and people will justify their decision despite any evidence which might indicate against it.

 

[dajop]

From what I've gathered on this forum and others...people are interested safety until it impacts their wallet. Then they take the cheapest flight.

Not always, I know a few people (myself included) who are not that comfortable taking Lion Air, regardless of the cost of alternatives. And same I think would apply with MH, where people actively avoid them, despite often being the lowest cost. Although personally I think both of MH's crashes last year could have equally happened to carriers many people do not have safety concerns about (such as SQ or LH), especially if you put any credence to the pilot sabotage theory on MH 370.

 

[RooFlyer]

From what I've gathered on this forum and others...people are interested safety until it impacts their wallet. Then they take the cheapest flight.

Obviously there are many who would fill that description, but I think there would be sufficient with the opposite view to make 'people' an over-generalisation. I think I can honestly say I have never, ever chosen a non Australian domestic flight on price (but I know many do not have that luxury). I have once flown a LCC carrier overseas - and that was Baltic Air, and I researched its history well before choosing it over a 12 hour train trip Riga to St Petersburg! Sorry, twice - I did Silk Air once too.

With the exception of QF! People will spend extra to fly QF based on their reputation for safety.

<snip>.

Very definitely. You get what you pay for. Like many here I have definite 'do not fly' airlines (and that's been expanded recently!!) and these are immutable; I have refused consulting work when the client wanted me to fly on one such airline and refused to put me on the more expensive, mainstream carrier.

Edit - when I was younger I was much less choosy! I think I flew Air Afrique once or twice and Egypt Air once!!

 

[juddles]

The article quotes 10 potential bad situations. The fatal Turkish crash in 2009 killed 9 people.

Sorry, but if you want to cast stones and sling mud, you could attack even Qantas for a stack of near-misses. You could claim that with QF 32, Qantas came within a beesd_ck of "slaughtering 469 people, while as the engine exploded the crew were casually chatting".

 

[RAM]

I agree the two MH losses are hard to balme on MH itself - a missile from a State-of-the-art anti-aircraft system will bring down a QF or EK as well as any MH.

The pilot/copilot/Spetznaz? impact on the other MH flight has been replicated most recently in Europe unfortunately. Mental health problems etc are not easy to spot in every case. Serial killers being a prime example.

All that aside, I always check several 'incident' sources before booking any flights just to make sure I've not missed anything. I value being able to complain about service issues far more highly than a few hundred dollars a flight. For many the cost difference would only be the same as cutting their overseas holiday (accommodation) by a day or two.

Air Asia X two years ago was borderline but in the end the age of the plane scheduled and improving reports as well as lack of incidents for a while swung the choice to use them. Coupled with MH to LHR. One year on the result would have been totally different (family would not have contemplated it).

As it happened I found Air Asia X to be very good, new plane, service on board and friendliness as good as any, even through to hostess hearing one of my children talking about buying some food while waiting at KL Airport for MH flight and offering to exhange MYR for Aust notes (at a much better rate than was available at KL Airport - I checked subsequently).

Eldest is travelling alone to Eur this year and spent 3 hours checking airline safety before paying an extra $60 or so for her return tickets than cheapest.

 

[Buzzard]

The article quotes 10 potential bad situations. The fatal Turkish crash in 2009 killed 9 people.

Sorry, but if you want to cast stones and sling mud, you could attack even Qantas for a stack of near-misses. You could claim that with QF 32, Qantas came within a beesd_ck of "slaughtering 469 people, while as the engine exploded the crew were casually chatting".

Who remembers the very near miss EK had in MEL. When taking off, the landing gear (A380?) almost snagged the fence, the aircraft was that far down the runway before lift off. Pilot errer IIRC.

 

[mannej]

Who remembers the very near miss EK had in MEL. When taking off, the landing gear (A380?) almost snagged the fence, the aircraft was that far down the runway before lift off. Pilot errer IIRC.

EK407 - A340-500

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emirates_Flight_407

 

[TomVexille]

Who remembers the very near miss EK had in MEL. When taking off, the landing gear (A380?) almost snagged the fence, the aircraft was that far down the runway before lift off. Pilot errer IIRC.

340 I believe it was. Missed a zero when entering weight into the flight computer IIRC, hence the engines not providing enough thrust for takeoff. Did take out a whole bunch of strobe lights and an antenna before just missing the fence.

Edit: mannej​ beat me to it