560 people dead, it doesn’t exactly inspire images of aviation safety teams patting each other on the back and saying well played now does it?

It should though, given that the death toll makes last year the safest in aviation history. When you consider just how many people fly that translates to an accident rate of just one in five million, making it more dangerous to pull down your pants and moon that neighbour that plays shitty music until the wee hours.

Last year also had two major air disasters, the Germanwings A320 in March deliberately caused by the co-pilot Andreas Lubitz and the Metrojet A321 in October due to a suspected bomb. Here’s the Telegraph:

According to the Aviation Safety Network (ASN), there were 14 other fatal crashes in 2015, resulting in 186 deaths, making a total of 560. Take away those two deliberate crashes, and it would have been the least deadly year for aviation since ASN’s records began. Indeed, when you count up the number of accidents resulting in fatalities, 2015 was the safest ever year for flying.

More stats via this detailed infographic:

So how does this year compare against the deadliest in recorded history? Consider yourself lucky if you flew in the seventies and lived to tell the tail:

Another feather in the caps of all those responsible for air safety last year:

The relatively low number of fatalities in 2015 is despite there being more planes in the sky than ever before. According to The World Bank, almost 763m flight tickets were sold to US passengers in 2014 (the most recent year for which it has statistics), up from 678m in 2004, 515m in 1994 and 340m in 1984. In Britain, there were 125m passengers carried in 2014, compared with 26m in 1984.

Now send this to that friend of yours who freaks out every time you plan a trip anywhere that involves flying. You know, the one that holds onto your arm so tightly during take off that all blood ceases to circulate.

[source:telegraph]