The world's safest airlines

AirlineRatings.com, which was launched in June 2013, has announced its top twenty safest airlines from 407 surveyed carriers. For the third year in a row, Qantas, which has a fatality free record in the jet era, comes in top. “In selecting Qantas as the world’s safest airline, AirlineRatings.com editors noted that over its 95-year history the world’s oldest continuously operating airline has amassed an extraordinary record of firsts in operations and safety and is now accepted as the industry’s most experienced carrier,” the website said. Making up the remainder of the top twenty in alphabetical order are: Air New Zealand, Alaska Airlines, All Nippon Airlines, American Airlines, Cathay Pacific Airways, Emirates, Etihad Airways, EVA Air, Finnair, Hawaiian Airlines, Japan Airlines, KLM, Lufthansa, Scandinavian Airline System, Singapore Airlines, Swiss, United Airlines, Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Australia. Of the 407 airlines surveyed, 148 have the top seven-star safety ranking and nearly 50 have three stars or less. There are 10 airlines with only one star - these airlines are from Indonesia, Nepal and Surinam. 2015 experienced a number of high profile incidents, including the GermanWings and Metrojet disasters, as well as British Airways' Flight 2276 which caught fire during take-off from Las Vegas in September. However, the 16 accidents and 560 fatalities in 2015 were a significant improvement on 2014 when there were 21 fatal accidents and 986 fatalities. 2015’s incidents were also well below the 10-year average of 31 accidents and 714 fatalities.

British Airways Flight 2276 which caught fire during take-off from Las Vegas in September