Reply #8: 600-650 is high..

[ddeclue]

http://www.ntsb.gov/aviation/Table1.htm

For 2005:

U.S. general aviation
1,669 321 562 557

GA is very safe and getting safer all the time.

It will never be as safe as the airlines but let's put it in perspective...you are much more likely to die of a heart attack or cancer than a GA trip... shall we ban the Big Macs now?

The news media only does this because plane crashes make for visually spectacular footage, not because there is any epidemic of crashes occurring.

Indeed I saw CNN show a GA plane put down with gear problems recently and they seemed rather disappointed that nothing happened. I assume they were hoping for a fiery crash. I'm glad the pilot disappointed them.

The media are a bunch of ghouls when it comes to aviation reporting. They did the same with the commercial airliner that had a gear problem about 6 months ago and again nothing happened.