Statistics show it’s still safe to fly in and out of Philadelphia airports, despite two blackouts April 28 and May 9 that kept controllers and pilots in northern New Jersey out of touch for a minute and a half, writes Max Marin for The Philadelphia Inquirer.
There have been 54 aircraft incidents in Philadelphia airspace since 1985, with fewer than half of those resulting in injuries and three crashes resulting in deaths, according to a Philadelphia Inquirer analysis of federal records.
One of those crashes includes January’s medical plane going down in Northeast Philadelphia.
There were at least 351,000 car crashes resulting in injuries in that same period, with over 4,600 deaths.
“It’s like 20 times safer than driving yourself to the airport,” said Kit Darby, an aviation consultant and career pilot who has logged over 23,000 flight hours. “It’s wonderfully safe. But the perception from the public is that it’s becoming dramatically less safe.”
Not that there aren’t concerns. After a burnt-out copper wire caused Philadelphia’s blackout, copper connections are being replaced with updated fiber-optic lines, and a temporary backup system is running as long-term upgrades are made nationally to air traffic control technology.
Find out more details on the status of Philadelphia’s air traffic control in The Philadelphia Inquirer.
