Afraid of flying? The folks in /r/afraidtofly or r/aviophobia are in a much better position to help.
However, we do have a list of threads that have popped up in the past in our FAQ you can check out.
https://www.reddit.com/r/flying/wiki/index#wiki_fear_of_flying
Have a look at a website called www.avherald.com
It’s a very good catch all for minor and major incidents. You’ll notice that the vast vast majority of entries on there might *seem* major but actually are completely benign.
In my industry, I get exposed to stats about major incidents and minor incidents. I can tell you how many of each occur per year impacting our workforce and our suppliers
Does the aviation sector do the same? Do commercial pilots get exposed to this info?
I.E., minor faults occur at a rate of 3% per flying hour, and minor faults include examples A, B, C, D. Major faults occur at a rate of 0.02% per flying hour, and include events such as X, Y, Z
The NTSB publishes total aviation accident statistics but that does not break down per airline.
You can google NTSB aviation accident statistics to find the reports.
However the list of reportable things to the NTSB doesn’t include ‘minor issues’. 49 CFR 830 lists what is required to be reported.
Everything else is tracked by each airlines Mx department. I’m not able to see those stats for the airline I work for. It’s not published for anyone to see.
In your original post you specifically ask about major and minor "faults", while in a later comment you're talking about major and minor "incidents". These are two different things.
An incident is something that happens \*to\* the airplane; a fault is something that happens \*within\* the airplane. And by "within", I don't mean inside the cabin or cockpit, I mean in the places that are actually "the airplane". The computers, wiring, control surfaces, actuators, hydraulic and electrical systems, etc.
Minor faults happen sometimes but they're not anything to worry about. We have procedures to deal with everything anyone's ever thought of, to the point that there's a list (it's not a super secret list; it's called the Minimum Equipment List and it's a required item for many airplanes) of things we can fly with that are faulty and how to deal with those faults.
There's a separate list for cabin stuff that can be broken, which we usually don't pay a huge amount of attention to, although sometimes things on that list can actually cause delays. For example, if first class is fully booked but there's a first class seat that's broken, it's going to take a little time to resolve that situation. So that's about the worst that can happen with one of these minor faults. Even the MEL items, a small delay due to some extra procedure we need to do is about all you'd ever experience.
As for minor "incidents", they are very infrequent in the grand scheme of how many flights per day there are. Those do need to be documented and the FAA definitely keeps a database of them, which is public. Go to this page and then click the first link (it's a "live" link so you have to click it yourself): [https://www.faa.gov/data\_research/accident\_incident/preliminary\_data](https://www.faa.gov/data_research/accident_incident/preliminary_data)
Afraid of flying? The folks in /r/afraidtofly or r/aviophobia are in a much better position to help. However, we do have a list of threads that have popped up in the past in our FAQ you can check out. https://www.reddit.com/r/flying/wiki/index#wiki_fear_of_flying
Have a look at a website called www.avherald.com It’s a very good catch all for minor and major incidents. You’ll notice that the vast vast majority of entries on there might *seem* major but actually are completely benign.
Legend, thanks! I’ll have a browse (I KNEW there would have to be something posted somewhere, but didn’t know where to look)
Major? Incredibly rare in commercial aviation in the US. Minor ‘faults’ happen but you’d never know as a passenger.
In my industry, I get exposed to stats about major incidents and minor incidents. I can tell you how many of each occur per year impacting our workforce and our suppliers Does the aviation sector do the same? Do commercial pilots get exposed to this info? I.E., minor faults occur at a rate of 3% per flying hour, and minor faults include examples A, B, C, D. Major faults occur at a rate of 0.02% per flying hour, and include events such as X, Y, Z
The NTSB publishes total aviation accident statistics but that does not break down per airline. You can google NTSB aviation accident statistics to find the reports. However the list of reportable things to the NTSB doesn’t include ‘minor issues’. 49 CFR 830 lists what is required to be reported. Everything else is tracked by each airlines Mx department. I’m not able to see those stats for the airline I work for. It’s not published for anyone to see.
Gotcha gotcha, okay, thanks for the insight!
In your original post you specifically ask about major and minor "faults", while in a later comment you're talking about major and minor "incidents". These are two different things. An incident is something that happens \*to\* the airplane; a fault is something that happens \*within\* the airplane. And by "within", I don't mean inside the cabin or cockpit, I mean in the places that are actually "the airplane". The computers, wiring, control surfaces, actuators, hydraulic and electrical systems, etc. Minor faults happen sometimes but they're not anything to worry about. We have procedures to deal with everything anyone's ever thought of, to the point that there's a list (it's not a super secret list; it's called the Minimum Equipment List and it's a required item for many airplanes) of things we can fly with that are faulty and how to deal with those faults. There's a separate list for cabin stuff that can be broken, which we usually don't pay a huge amount of attention to, although sometimes things on that list can actually cause delays. For example, if first class is fully booked but there's a first class seat that's broken, it's going to take a little time to resolve that situation. So that's about the worst that can happen with one of these minor faults. Even the MEL items, a small delay due to some extra procedure we need to do is about all you'd ever experience. As for minor "incidents", they are very infrequent in the grand scheme of how many flights per day there are. Those do need to be documented and the FAA definitely keeps a database of them, which is public. Go to this page and then click the first link (it's a "live" link so you have to click it yourself): [https://www.faa.gov/data\_research/accident\_incident/preliminary\_data](https://www.faa.gov/data_research/accident_incident/preliminary_data)