The general aviation (GA) fatal accident rate in the United States is trending in the right direction, but there still is much room for improvement, and weather often is cited as a contributing factor in GA accidents.
According to the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) GA safety Fact Sheet, 209 fatal GA accidents resulted in 347 fatalities in fiscal year 2017, the 12-month period ended Sept. 30, 2017. The fatal accident rate for the year, which was 0.84 per 100,000 flight hours, has declined steadily since fiscal year 2014, and is down nearly 24 percent since fiscal year 2010, when the rate was 1.1 fatal accidents per 100,000 flight hours.
GA can be broken down into two sectors: commercial or business, which is the part of GA that focuses on the business use of airplanes and helicopters, and noncommercial or private. FAA maintains that the United States…
