A list of some of the Safest Airlines in the World (2009)

Whilst overall Lifthansa is a good airline, I would never fly them between Europe and Sth Africa, as they use old 747-400 aircraft with cramped seats and no entertainment system. Within Europe they are pretty good apart from being rather limited in the service they offer

I currently live in Canada and when I fly to my native country back home i only use Lufthansa (not Air Canada, even if Air Canada's service is ok, but food is simply north-american crap), it's unlikely at least in Europe there is any other company better than Lufthansa. It's very reliable, its food is as good as it can get, it's punctual (German, right ?) and extremely efficient (German again). Flight personnel is very polite and careful with passengers. Austrian Airlines would be close to Lufthansa, qualitywise, but their prices sky-rocket. All in all, even if British Airways is better value for the money, Lufthansa still wins the game. It's just the best. If all European companies would have the same standard, it would just be great, maybe somewhere in the future Lufthansa would be able to buy all European carriers (joking, LOL....or not)

I have always been very happy with Lufthansa's performance. And the staff is very aware of there passangers and safety rules.

Lufthansa's safety record might not be as flawless as the one from Qantas. But considering the size of the airline and the quality of the pilots (I'd say Lufthansa has one of the best pilots worldwide) I would consider Lufthansa to be at least in Europe Nr.1 in terms of safety. Lufthansa is also very wealthy and doesn't have the need to cut costs on maintainance or pilot training.

Best airline on earth, I been there and by no accident in about 35 years and that is the only one time that happened, it should be 1.

I know that they have one of the youngest fleets in Europe. Most commercial planes doenst have more then 7/8 years.

It have the most rigorous airplanes inspections in Europe. Many airlines go to TAP for maintenance.

One of the most safest airlines in the world. It's one of the best!

This is one of the best airliner that I have ever flew. They have no fatalities since their foundation at 1975 and it's safety records are 100%

No fatalities since first started in 1975. Great service ,well trained staff and now using the safest plane,Boeing 777 for longer flights .A320,321,319 used on short haul.

Even if it is a great airline(with very expensive food), it has two crashes. 26 March 1991 — Singapore Airlines Flight 117 was hijacked by Pakistani militants en route to Singapore, where it was stormed by the Singapore Special Operations Force. All of the hijackers were killed in the operation, with no fatalities amongst the passengers and crew. 31 October 2000 — Singapore Airlines Flight 006 operated by a Boeing 747-400, crashed at Chiang Kai-shek International Airport (now Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport) in Taiwan killing 83 people aboard and injuring 71 people after the plane took off on a closed runway and hit construction equipment. This occurred during the heavy rain caused by Typhoon Xangsane. SQ006 was the first fatal crash of a Singapore Airlines aircraft and the first fatal crash of the Boeing 747-400.

Korean Air is fine, but Asiana is way much better in terms of safety, service and even price.

Yes, they're safety has greatly approved after the 21st century. But another airline from Korea called Asiana is also great, too.

Wow it just cost about $2-$23 for flying with it, It is very safe and very cheap to fly in.

Thanks to Air Asia i `ve been flying on this quite number of times and feel much safer of their safety records

best low cost carrier so far

this airline is safe..you can trust on the pilot...and the flight attendants are very polite and cheerful!!

This Airline has some of the world's best trained pilots! I have proven it time and again. Their pilots can land these well maintained planes as smooth as silk. Wow! The smoothest landing ever! No American Airline can even compare with that. What a shame!

All of Philippine Airlines' planes are maintained by LufthansaTechnik. This Airline has one of the lowest record of errors in the world.

The fact AirFrance has no idea why that plane went down 2? 3? years ago in the Atlantic ocean, can't retrieve the flight recorder and has had numerous problems associated with its flights prove to me they're not safe.

@guest above. The reason PIA is at the top is because it is crap, people vote it up as a joke. :P

I would hardly call a Concorde pilot "inexperienced", there are far less safe airlines that are above this airline. So instead of voting down AirFrance perhaps people should vote down other airlines. Statistically Air France is 4X safer than paki international airlines and yet look how far up the page they are!

Air France "claimed" that a 20cm thin strip of metal on the runway caused their concorde to crash. Hard to believe considering that they had they tried to hide other factors such as an inexperienced pilot, and overfilling the fuel tank. Planes are built to withstand such small pieces of debris on runways. They simply have had too many major crashes to be considered safe.

I think people need to get real; this is AirFrance we are talking about. El Al has been voted safer, no offence but I mean really? Lets go through the accidents, Concorde 2000 - this could have happened to a BA Concorde as well and wasn't AF fault. The A340 at Toronto 2005 - this was due to poor weather and had nothing to do with the mechanics of the aircraft. A330 2009 - This was due to faulty pitot tubes fitted by Airbus. I would have no problem flying with AirFrance if someone gave me a ticket with them tomorrow; in fact AF is my no. 1 choice when flying to France.

I've read about too many Air France accidents to want to fly on their aircraft. The last accident was less than a year ago (June 1st, 2009) with a 100% total loss of life. Air France still has no idea what occured to call the incident and they're still flying the same model of aircraft. Unless this airliner is your pride and joy...go somewhere else.

Qatar Airways wins Airline of the Year title at the 2011 World Airline Awards™ Plus 0% crash and accidents rate.

so the soviet union shoots down a commercial plane and you attribute it to the airline? lol...

Not quite true. Aero Oy / Finnair has crashed four times with fatalities: 1927 (3 dead), 1940 (shot down during war), 1961 (25 dead) and 1963 (20 dead)

Finnair is one of the oldest still operational airlines in the world. This carrier was established 1923 and have zero (0) fatalities. Safest airline in the world together with Australian Quantas. Most comprehensive and rigorous maintenance program and the pilots often coming from the FInnish Air Force.

To add excellent food, yes, it is hard to beleive, you get to choose from a menu, that is in economy!

Probably one of the best airlines in the World, polite friendly staff and perfect flying experience to all European Destinations.

A good airline with a good safey record, and as such does not warrant to be -2 points. Have had a technical agreement with Qantas for many years with close links

Skytrax and Jacdec both agree that its among the best.

Actually Air New Zealand has only had one major accident since it commenced flying earliy last century (NB before they were renamed Air New Zealand, they were called Trans Empire Airways or TEAL, which remains their official colour!)

No one every gives any credit to Air New Zealand. They have been in the top ten best airlines for a few years now and they aren't that unsafe they had one major accident 31 years ago.

dude that 797 accident was cuz of electrical problems, derp

I'm Scared Of That 797 Incident In The 1980's.

Nearly every carrier does this so it is not unique to Air Canada at all. They are termed A, B, C and D checks and can be compared a little to vehcile servicing (though the airline one is based on air miles flown while the car based on kms travelled).

I knew someone who worked there on the corporate side of things. They have some of the most rigorous inspecting practices in the world. Every plane goes through a periodic inspection where the entire aircraft is stripped down, taken apart, right down to the frame, inspected and then rebuilt. I wonder how many carriers do that for their aircraft.

Air Canada has had several incidences with recorded fatalities. Wikipedia Air Canada. Despite it, Air Canada remains one of the safest airlines in the world and was ranked number 1 in North America by Skytrax in 2009 and 2010.

What about the DC-8 that went down in Woodbridge shortly after take off from Toronto Airport - circa late 60s?

Good company, bad food

Air Canada has had very few hiccups over the years. When they just got the B-767 the ground crew hadnt been trained in metric yet which was a flaw on AC's part, but the Captain managed to glide a 767 to an abandoned air strip and everyone walked away. As far as I know AC has never has a 100% fatal accident. There have been deaths yes, but not 100% dead.

Airline accidents are not the result of one thing or one persons fault. Have you ever heard about swiss cheese theory? In the KLM case the action of the pilot was just one of the holes which lined up and resulted in the disaster. We can only hope that KLM learned from that incident and plugged as many of them as possible.

The captain mentioned above was in a difficult situation. Because of terror and bad weather the working hours of the cabin crew would run out. Trade unions are not flexible, as we know. So he tried to take off as quickly as possible. - And that was the result.

The one who posted the 1st comment is one of those IDIOTS just like the Capt. of that KLM flight. I mean common, all airline employees make mistakes that ends up good some times, but also bad. American Airlines is one of them, just see how many crashed they have under their name, but I bet you are still flying with them as if nothing happened.

Who every posted the first comment clearly doesn't understand that people all make mistakes and now the entire airline has to suffer because of one idoit. That is not fair!

I've flown many times with KLM .In my mind there the very best of all.One idiot can happen anywhere. Idiots happen!

The comment above is clearly written by someone who doesn't understand that because one stupid pilot made an error its not the fault of the ENTIRE airline!

KLM's safety record was seriouslt smudged when a Captain decided to take off in a small regional airport that was packed and slammed into a Pan Am jet. I know this sounds harsh but I will NEVER fly KLM because of this pilot and this pilot only. He tarnished KLM big time!

PIA has the honour of having the first 777-200LR

PIA is also one of the cheapest airlines of the world.

Apart from being safe, PIA is the only airline in the world which serves WHOLE MEAL in even 1 hour flights.

I have travelled in PIA from UK to pakistan and it is the best in terms of saftey and comfort

Excellent airline 2-3 accidents since 1982.very safe,so it deserves to be number 3.

This is very true, Hospitality is very low, thats good, you should say NIL. The worst.

Since its inception in 1973 Air Niugini has never encountered an accident and has maintained one of the world's best safest record.

Southwest is THE safest airline in the world statistically. Southwest west has flown more flights and passengers than any other airline in history and yet not had a single fatal accident. Do Southwest a favour... vote them up.

No one seems to give Southwest a safety credit at all. I've only heard one one death related to SWA and the person was in a passing car on a highway. SWA has had two runway overruns (overruns are more common than you think with all airliners). Other than that all I've heard of was a successful emergency landing after loss of cabin pressure. I'd trust these guys. They have great mechanics on staff and until someone crashes a Southwest jet, I'll be flying them thank you vey much.

I have no idea why people are giving Air Transat such a bad wrap. This airline has only ever had one incident and it was 100% survivable and involved starvation of fuel. The pilots followed ever procedure necessary to ensure the aircraft landed safely. I would fly with them because I have faith that Air Transat was smart enoguh to train all their pilots to do just as the pilot of thier only incident did.

One of the future leading companies in the Balkan. They possess a high quality service and outstanding fleet.

This is really the very BEST airline in the universe....you can trust the airline because it is super safe and the plane is so cool and nice!! my number 1 recommended airline!!

I've always flown by Emirates and the service is great :D

voted best airline in the world. Ive flown with Emirates every single time ive went overseas and im sticking with it.

you failed to mention that Qantas pilots are one of the best if not the best train commercial pilots in the world ,with numerous airline using Qantas train pilots, the service may have droped but at least you get to your destination and in safe hands and i would say would put it in my books number one.

Apart from the downing of the Helderberg in 1986, no other serious accidents. It is 1 of 2 unexplained air crashes in the world. The only airline I will fly in Africa. great airline!

An excellent airline, and the only one I would fly in Africa

south african airways has never been on the blacklist

The only African airline that wasn't put on the black list? I know Royal Air Maroc has never been on it and I don't think Egypt Air has. I don't think South African Airways has either, maybe during partide?