:dubious:
In the USA about 6,000. That includes private and commercial.
I have a related question. Whenever I am forced to have a discussion with somebody concerning the safety of commercial airline travel, I always say something along the lines of “I’ll bet that there are more people in the air in commercial airliners right at this very instant than have ever been killed in commercial airline failures in the entire history of commercial aviation.” Is there any validity to this assertion? It would certainly seem so given the 6,000 figure (although I’m only talking about large passenger jets).
That would be interesting to find out. The 6,000 figure came from one of my flight school text books. I do know from AOPA that private passenger airplane accident stats match those of motorcycle accidents.
Here’s an interesting graphic representation: Click on the link at the lower left that says “US Traffic.”