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HK Express was crowned the world’s safest budget airline on Tuesday, while Air New Zealand successfully defended its title as the safest traditional airline among 385 air carriers across the world, a latest evaluation by AirlineRatings.com revealed.
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The rankings are based on multiple key factors, including its fleet age, size, incident frequency, fatalities, financial performance, safety audit results, pilot skills and training.
Among 385 airlines across the world, the aviation safety and product rating website chose 25 safest traditional airlines and 25 safest budget airlines, and HK Express under Cathay Group was ranked first, followed by Australian-based Jetstar Group and Ireland-based Ryanair.
This marks the second award for HK Express after it was recognized as the Fastest Growing Airline of 2024 by global travel data platform OAG last week.
For traditional airlines, Air New Zealand remains the safest in the world, followed by Australian airlines Qantas, while Hong Kong’s flagship carrier Cathay Pacific shared third place with Qatar Airways and Emirates.
Virgin Australia and Etihad Airways came fourth and fifth, respectively, followed by Japan’s All Nippon Airways, Taiwan’s Eva Air and Korean Air.
Two traditional airlines were dropped out of the list, including Singapore Airlines and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines.
Singapore Airlines flight SQ321 flying from the United Kingdom’s London Heathrow Airport to Singapore’s Changi Airport experienced severe in-flight turbulence last May and had to be diverted to Thailand’s Suvarnabhumi Airport in Bangkok, causing one death and 104 injured among 229 passengers on board.
The Royal Dutch Airlines also experienced a fatal incident after a person was sucked into the engine of one of its airplanes. Another of the carrier’s planes also skid off the runway in an emergency landing last month. Fortunately, no one was hurt.
(Michael Shum)
