Statistical summary: Air transportation occurrences in 2017

This document is a summary of selected 2017 aviation safety data.

The TSB gathers and uses this data during the course of its investigations to analyse safety deficiencies and identify risks in the Canadian transportation system.

It should be noted that certain characteristics of the data constrain statistical analysis and identification of emerging trends. These include the small totals of accidents and incidents, the large variability in the data from year to year, and changes to regulations and definitions. The reader is cautioned to keep these limitations in mind when viewing this summary to avoid drawing conclusions that cannot be supported by statistical analysis.

The 2017 data were collected according to the reporting requirements described in the TSB Regulations in force during that calendar year.

The statistics presented here reflect the TSB database at 11 February 2018. Since the occurrence data are constantly being updated in the live database, the statistics may change slightly over time.

Also, as many occurrences are not formally investigated, information recorded on some occurrences may not have been verified.

Accidents

Overview of accidents and fatalities

In 2017, a total of 240 aviation accidents were reported to the TSB, up from the previous year's total of 230, but 13% below the average of 276 over the previous 10 years (2007 to 2016). Of the total, 208 involved Canadian-registered aircraft (excluding ultra-lights),^{Footnote 1} a small increase from the previous year's total of 200, but 13% below the average of 238 for the previous 10 years.

The 2017 estimate of flying activity for Canadian-registered aircraft is 4 565 000 hours,^{Footnote 2} and the corresponding accident rate for Canadian-registered aircraft was 4.3 accidents per 100 000 flying hours, unchanged from 2016. Analysis using linear regression indicates a statistically significant downward trend in accident rates (p < .0001)^{Footnote 3} over the 11-year period from 2007 to 2017 (Figure 1). Similarly, the 2017 accident rate of 3.2 accidents per 100 000 aircraft movements decreased from the 2016 rate of 3.3 accidents per 100 000 aircraft movements and also indicates a statistically significant downward trend (p < .01) over the same 11-year period (data not shown).

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The 208 accidents involving Canadian-registered aircraft (Figure 2) included 171 accidents involving aeroplanes,^{Footnote 4} and 27 accidents involving helicopters. The remaining 10 accidents involved 5 gliders, 1 gyroplane, 1 balloon, and 3 unmanned aerial systems (UAS) of which 2 were fixed-wing and 1 was a rotary-wing UAS.

Seventy-five Canadian-registered commercially operated aeroplanes (10 airliners, 5 commuters, 19 air taxis, 13 aerial work, and 28 flight training aircraft) were involved in 71 accidents in 2017, which is an increase from 42 commercial accidents the previous year, and above the previous 10-year average of 67.3. The increase in commercial accidents is reflected in almost every category of operator, but most notably involved 9 airliner accidents (involving 10 aircraft) which is up from 1 commercial airliner accident in 2016, and above the previous 10-year average of 4.9. Two of the 9 airliner accidents that occurred in 2017 were formally investigated by the TSB. Three were low speed ground collisions, 2 involved injuries to cabin crew, 1 involved a lightning strike, and 1 involved damage related to engine failure. A further 27 accidents involved commercially-operated flight-training aircraft (in the category “other commercial type” in Table 2), which is up from 16 accidents in 2016, and above the 10-year average of 19.2 in this category.

Canadian-registered commercially operated aeroplanes were involved in 7 fatal accidents that resulted in a total of 14 fatalities in 2017. One fatal accident involved an airliner, 1 involved air taxi operations, 2 involved aerial work, and 3 involved flight training.

The number of accidents involving Canadian-registered private/other aeroplanes fell to 101 in 2017, 20% lower than the previous 10-year average of 126. In 2017, 10 of these accidents resulted in fatalities, down from 18 in 2016, and below the average of 14 for the previous 10 years.

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In 2017, 20 fatal accidents involved Canadian-registered aircraft other than ultra-lights (Figure 3), down somewhat from the 2016 total of 24, and below the average of 27 for the previous 10-year period.

The number of fatalities in 2017 (31), was lower than the 2016 total of 34, and well below the average of 49 for the previous 10-year period. However, the number of persons with serious injuries was 27, up from 17 in 2016, but still below the average of 34 over the previous 10 years (data not shown).

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Of the 31 fatalities in 2017, 27 involved crew and 4 involved passengers. One additional fatality involved the pilot of an ultra-light aircraft.

Twenty-seven accidents involving Canadian-registered helicopters were tallied in 2017. This number was slightly lower than the average of 34 such accidents per year over the previous 10-year period. Two of the 27 accidents were fatal, accounting for 5 fatalities. The total number of fatal accidents (2) compares favourably with previous yearly averages of approximately 5, and the previous 10-year average of 11 (data not shown).

In 2017, 25 accidents in Canada involved Canadian-registered ultra-light aircraft. This is up slightly from 22 ultra-light accidents in 2016, and not far from the average of 27 accidents per year over the previous 10 years. One of these accidents was fatal, resulting in a single fatality.

In 2017, 7 accidents involved 8 foreign-registered aircraft in Canada, with no resulting fatalities.

Accidents by selected categories

Operation type (Table 6)

In 2017, there were 171 accidents involving Canadian-registered aeroplanes. These accidents occurred mainly on flights taken for: pleasure or travel (53%), training flights (18%), and commercial air transport (16%). Almost a quarter (22%) of helicopter accidents occurred on training flights. Categories where helicopter accidents have been more common in past years (air transport, and pleasure or travel) represented fewer accidents in 2017. For instance, there were 3 helicopter accidents in air transport operations in 2017, whereas the previous 10-year average was 13.

Province/Territory (Table 8)

Of the accidents involving Canadian-registered aircraft in 2017, 43% occurred in Ontario or Quebec. This proportion is typical compared to previous years. British Columbia (17%) and Alberta (14%) also accounted for a sizeable share of accidents in 2017. Following the pattern of generally decreasing accident counts, most regions in Canada experienced fewer accidents than the previous 10-year average (Figure 4). Also, the number of accidents outside Canada involving Canadian-registered aircraft was above the previous 10-year average.

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Accident events and phases

Accidents may be analyzed in more detail by examining the nature and distribution of selected events that contributed to an occurrence. Tables 11 through 14 show counts of accidents involving selected event types within each phase of flight.

Although a single accident may involve more than one event within a phase of flight, that accident is only counted once in the phase total. Therefore, the total number of accidents for each event within a phase will not sum to the total number of accidents within a phase. For example, in the "take-off" phase, if an accident involves both "loss of control" and "power loss" events, the accident is counted once in each event category within the phase, but only once in the overall phase total. As well, approximately 38% of aeroplane accidents and 29% of helicopter accidents involve events in more than one phase of flight (not including "post-impact"), so the number of accidents shown in Figure 5 and Figure 6 sum to more than the total number of accidents.

Over the past 11 years (2007–2017), the distribution of aeroplane accident events (Figure 5) shows the greatest numbers of events are associated with landing (56% of aeroplane accidents involve an event in the landing phase) and take-off (23%) phases of flight, followed by en route (15%) and approach (13%) phases. The greatest numbers of helicopter accident events (Figure 6) were associated with landing (41%), manoeuvering^{Footnote 5} (24%), en route (22%), takeoff (17%), and approach (12%) phases of flight.

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From 2007 to 2017 (Table 11), of the 1261 aeroplane accidents with landing phase events, 21% involved collision with object, 21% involved missing or going off the runway, 21% involved landing gear collapse or retraction, and 20% involved a nosedown or overturning event. Of the 522 aeroplane accidents with take-off phase events, 28% involved collision with terrain, 27% involved collision with object, 25% involved loss of control, and 25% involved power loss.

Collision with terrain was the predominant event in fatal aeroplane accidents from 2007 to 2017 (Table 13). Collision with terrain was involved in 60% of the 55 fatal aeroplane accidents with takeoff phase events, 68% of 82 fatal aeroplane accidents with en route phase events, 80% of 30 fatal aeroplane accidents with manoeuvering phase events, 70% of 50 fatal aeroplane accidents with approach phase events, and 54% of 35 fatal aeroplane accidents with landing phase events.

From 2007 to 2017 (Table 12), of the 154 helicopter accidents with landing phase events, 25% involved a collision with object, 20% involved a hard landing, 19% involved collision with terrain, and 18% involved loss of control. Of the 91 helicopter accidents with manoeuvering phase events, 48% involved collision with terrain, 35% involved loss of control, and 25% involved an operations related event.

Collision with terrain was also the predominant event in fatal helicopter accidents from 2007 to 2017 (Table 14). Collision with terrain was involved in 6 of 8 fatal helicopter accidents with takeoff phase events, 17 of 24 fatal helicopter accidents with en route phase events, 13 of 20 fatal helicopter accidents with manoeuvering phase events, 3 of 7 fatal helicopter accidents with approach phase events, and 6 of 9 fatal helicopter accidents with landing phase events.

Incidents

Overview of Incidents

Pursuant to TSB mandatory incident reporting requirements, 934 incidents were reported in 2017, with 861 involving Canadian-registered aircraft. This is a 17% increase from the 2016 total of 737, and a 32% increase from the average of 653 for the previous 10 years. However, the apparent increase in incidents is largely explained by two recent changes. First, new regulations became effective 1 July 2014. Under the new reporting requirements, aviation incidents include aircraft having a maximum certificated take-off weight greater than 2250 kg (formerly 5700 kg) and aircraft being operated under an air operator certificate issued under the Canadian Aviation Regulations (CARs) Part VII. Second, the TSB has implemented changes to improve data capture for incidents involving Canadian-registered aircraft outside of Canada. This change took effect mid way through 2016. Together these changes substantially increased the number of reportable incidents.

In 2017, the most frequent incident types (Figure 7) involving all Canadian-registered and foreign-registered aircraft were: Declared emergency (37%), Risk of collision/Loss of separation (18%), and Smoke/Fire (11%).

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Data tables