Motivation

Should Travelers Avoid Flying Airlines That Have Had Crashes in the Past?

The data set contains crash data from many airlines. After a crash people move to other airlines for safety. Does that mean than other airlines are more safe than the airlines that crashed? We will take a look at historical data to find if there is a pattern after the crash or is it just a fear

Obtain Data

Data Source

Parameters
- airline: Airline (asterisk indicates that regional subsidiaries are included)
- avail_seat_km_per_week: Available seat kilometers flown every week
- incidents_85_99: Total number of incidents, 1985–1999
- fatal_accidents_85_99: Total number of fatal accidents, 1985–1999
- fatalities_85_99: Total number of fatalities, 1985–1999
- incidents_00_14: Total number of incidents, 2000–2014
- fatal_accidents_00_14: Total number of fatal accidents, 2000–2014
- fatalities_00_14: Total number of fatalities, 2000–2014

Source: https://github.com/fivethirtyeight/data/blob/master/airline-safety/airline-safety.csv

SQL Database

Data can be normalised in relation data structure. Following is the structure of the relation data. The main detail table tblAirlinesIncident contains details of the incident and is related to master tables tblAirlines, tblIncidentTypeMst and tblYearRange using foreign key.

View SQL Queries: https://github.com/monuchacko/cuny_msds/blob/master/data_607/DATA607_FinalProject.sql

SQL Data

MongoDB

Data can be stored in scalable document sets in MongoDB. Every row is stored in json format as document. This approach can make this data scalable. Here we are inserting document for each row. For every row MongoDB creates an identifier _id. Airlines incident data is stored with all the fields and corresponding value.

SQL MongoDB

CSV data

Data can be extracted from CSV to data frame using R packages. This data can be cleaned and transformed. In the code below we are loading data directly from the source. The data is inspected and cleaned.

airline avail_seat_km_per_week incidents_85_99 fatal_accidents_85_99 fatalities_85_99 incidents_00_14 fatal_accidents_00_14 fatalities_00_14
Aer Lingus 320906734 2 0 0 0 0 0
Aeroflot* 1197672318 76 14 128 6 1 88
Aerolineas Argentinas 385803648 6 0 0 1 0 0
Aeromexico* 596871813 3 1 64 5 0 0
Air Canada 1865253802 2 0 0 2 0 0
Air France 3004002661 14 4 79 6 2 337

Scrub Data

Extraction/ Transformation

x
Aer Lingus
Aeroflot
Aerolineas Argentinas
Aeromexico
Air Canada
Air France
x
incident
accident
fatalities
x
yr_85_99
yr_00_14
## 'data.frame':    56 obs. of  8 variables:
##  $ airline               : chr  "Aer Lingus" "Aeroflot" "Aerolineas Argentinas" "Aeromexico" ...
##  $ avail_seat_km_per_week: num  3.21e+08 1.20e+09 3.86e+08 5.97e+08 1.87e+09 ...
##  $ incidents_85_99       : int  2 76 6 3 2 14 2 3 5 7 ...
##  $ fatal_accidents_85_99 : int  0 14 0 1 0 4 1 0 0 2 ...
##  $ fatalities_85_99      : int  0 128 0 64 0 79 329 0 0 50 ...
##  $ incidents_00_14       : int  0 6 1 5 2 6 4 5 5 4 ...
##  $ fatal_accidents_00_14 : int  0 1 0 0 0 2 1 1 1 0 ...
##  $ fatalities_00_14      : int  0 88 0 0 0 337 158 7 88 0 ...
## [1] "airline"                "avail_seat_km_per_week"
## [3] "incident"               "count"
## [1] 1384621305
airline avail_seat_km_per_week incident count incident_type incident_year incident_ratio
Aer Lingus 320906734 incidents_85_99 2 incident 1999 160
Aeroflot 1197672318 incidents_85_99 76 incident 1999 16
Aerolineas Argentinas 385803648 incidents_85_99 6 incident 1999 64
Aeromexico 596871813 incidents_85_99 3 incident 1999 199
Air Canada 1865253802 incidents_85_99 2 incident 1999 933
Air France 3004002661 incidents_85_99 14 incident 1999 215
## [1] 30.34524
## [1] 85.49267
## [1] 56  4
## [1] 336   7

Model Data

##                 airline avail_seat_km_per_week incidents_85_99
## 1            Aer Lingus              320906734               2
## 2              Aeroflot             1197672318              76
## 3 Aerolineas Argentinas              385803648               6
## 4            Aeromexico              596871813               3
## 5            Air Canada             1865253802               2
## 6            Air France             3004002661              14
##   fatal_accidents_85_99 fatalities_85_99 incidents_00_14
## 1                     0                0               0
## 2                    14              128               6
## 3                     0                0               1
## 4                     1               64               5
## 5                     0                0               2
## 6                     4               79               6
##   fatal_accidents_00_14 fatalities_00_14
## 1                     0                0
## 2                     1               88
## 3                     0                0
## 4                     0                0
## 5                     0                0
## 6                     2              337

Interpret Results

Airlines Safety

Passengers tend to avoid airlines that had major incident. They consider these airlines unsafe. We are going to use data to find out if this is true or based on fear. To find out we have a dataset of incidence, year the incident occurred and few other data.

After loading the data, we performed transformation. We put them in categories based on the incident type. We explored the data using the OSEMN workflow. After analyzing we did not see any pattern to suggest the airline that had major incident continued to be unsafe. The below heat map of airlines and incidence per year does not have a continuing pattern. These incidences appear to be independent. If we look at the distribution (see chart above), we cannot find a pattern of normal distribution suggesting that the incidences are not related to each other.

The table below shows the incidence type, year, incidence count and ratio to size for every airlines. After examining the data there is no correlation. We can therefore conclude that safety based on major airline incidence are influenced by fear rather than reality.

Airlines Incident Type Year Count Ratio
Aer Lingus incident 1999 2 160
Aeroflot incident 1999 76 16
Aerolineas Argentinas incident 1999 6 64
Aeromexico incident 1999 3 199
Air Canada incident 1999 2 933
Air France incident 1999 14 215
Air India incident 1999 2 435
Air New Zealand incident 1999 3 237
Alaska Airlines incident 1999 5 193
Alitalia incident 1999 7 100
All Nippon Airways incident 1999 3 614
American incident 1999 21 249
Austrian Airlines incident 1999 1 358
Avianca incident 1999 5 79
British Airways incident 1999 4 795
Cathay Pacific incident 1999 0 2582
China Airlines incident 1999 12 68
Condor incident 1999 2 209
COPA incident 1999 3 183
Delta / Northwest incident 1999 24 272
Egyptair incident 1999 8 70
El Al incident 1999 1 335
Ethiopian Airlines incident 1999 25 20
Finnair incident 1999 1 506
Garuda Indonesia incident 1999 10 61
Gulf Air incident 1999 1 301
Hawaiian Airlines incident 1999 0 494
Iberia incident 1999 4 293
Japan Airlines incident 1999 3 525
Kenya Airways incident 1999 2 139
KLM incident 1999 7 268
Korean Air incident 1999 12 145
LAN Airlines incident 1999 3 334
Lufthansa incident 1999 6 571
Malaysia Airlines incident 1999 3 346
Pakistan International incident 1999 8 44
Philippine Airlines incident 1999 7 59
Qantas incident 1999 1 1917
Royal Air Maroc incident 1999 5 59
SAS incident 1999 5 137
Saudi Arabian incident 1999 7 123
Singapore Airlines incident 1999 2 1188
South African incident 1999 2 326
Southwest Airlines incident 1999 1 3277
Sri Lankan / AirLanka incident 1999 2 163
SWISS incident 1999 2 396
TACA incident 1999 3 86
TAM incident 1999 8 189
TAP - Air Portugal incident 1999 0 619
Thai Airways incident 1999 8 213
Turkish Airlines incident 1999 8 243
United / Continental incident 1999 19 376
US Airways / America West incident 1999 16 153
Vietnam Airlines incident 1999 7 89
Virgin Atlantic incident 1999 1 1005
Xiamen Airlines incident 1999 9 48
Aer Lingus fatal_accident 1999 0 321
Aeroflot fatal_accident 1999 14 86
Aerolineas Argentinas fatal_accident 1999 0 386
Aeromexico fatal_accident 1999 1 597
Air Canada fatal_accident 1999 0 1865
Air France fatal_accident 1999 4 751
Air India fatal_accident 1999 1 869
Air New Zealand fatal_accident 1999 0 710
Alaska Airlines fatal_accident 1999 0 965
Alitalia fatal_accident 1999 2 349
All Nippon Airways fatal_accident 1999 1 1841
American fatal_accident 1999 5 1046
Austrian Airlines fatal_accident 1999 0 358
Avianca fatal_accident 1999 3 132
British Airways fatal_accident 1999 0 3180
Cathay Pacific fatal_accident 1999 0 2582
China Airlines fatal_accident 1999 6 136
Condor fatal_accident 1999 1 418
COPA fatal_accident 1999 1 550
Delta / Northwest fatal_accident 1999 12 544
Egyptair fatal_accident 1999 3 186
El Al fatal_accident 1999 1 335
Ethiopian Airlines fatal_accident 1999 5 98
Finnair fatal_accident 1999 0 506
Garuda Indonesia fatal_accident 1999 3 204
Gulf Air fatal_accident 1999 0 301
Hawaiian Airlines fatal_accident 1999 0 494
Iberia fatal_accident 1999 1 1173
Japan Airlines fatal_accident 1999 1 1574
Kenya Airways fatal_accident 1999 0 277
KLM fatal_accident 1999 1 1875
Korean Air fatal_accident 1999 5 347
LAN Airlines fatal_accident 1999 2 501
Lufthansa fatal_accident 1999 1 3427
Malaysia Airlines fatal_accident 1999 1 1039
Pakistan International fatal_accident 1999 3 116
Philippine Airlines fatal_accident 1999 4 103
Qantas fatal_accident 1999 0 1917
Royal Air Maroc fatal_accident 1999 3 99
SAS fatal_accident 1999 0 683
Saudi Arabian fatal_accident 1999 2 430
Singapore Airlines fatal_accident 1999 2 1188
South African fatal_accident 1999 1 652
Southwest Airlines fatal_accident 1999 0 3277
Sri Lankan / AirLanka fatal_accident 1999 1 326
SWISS fatal_accident 1999 1 793
TACA fatal_accident 1999 1 259
TAM fatal_accident 1999 3 503
TAP - Air Portugal fatal_accident 1999 0 619
Thai Airways fatal_accident 1999 4 426
Turkish Airlines fatal_accident 1999 3 649
United / Continental fatal_accident 1999 8 892
US Airways / America West fatal_accident 1999 7 351
Vietnam Airlines fatal_accident 1999 3 208
Virgin Atlantic fatal_accident 1999 0 1005
Xiamen Airlines fatal_accident 1999 1 430
Aer Lingus fatalities 1999 0 321
Aeroflot fatalities 1999 128 9
Aerolineas Argentinas fatalities 1999 0 386
Aeromexico fatalities 1999 64 9
Air Canada fatalities 1999 0 1865
Air France fatalities 1999 79 38
Air India fatalities 1999 329 3
Air New Zealand fatalities 1999 0 710
Alaska Airlines fatalities 1999 0 965
Alitalia fatalities 1999 50 14
All Nippon Airways fatalities 1999 1 1841
American fatalities 1999 101 52
Austrian Airlines fatalities 1999 0 358
Avianca fatalities 1999 323 1
British Airways fatalities 1999 0 3180
Cathay Pacific fatalities 1999 0 2582
China Airlines fatalities 1999 535 2
Condor fatalities 1999 16 26
COPA fatalities 1999 47 12
Delta / Northwest fatalities 1999 407 16
Egyptair fatalities 1999 282 2
El Al fatalities 1999 4 84
Ethiopian Airlines fatalities 1999 167 3
Finnair fatalities 1999 0 506
Garuda Indonesia fatalities 1999 260 2
Gulf Air fatalities 1999 0 301
Hawaiian Airlines fatalities 1999 0 494
Iberia fatalities 1999 148 8
Japan Airlines fatalities 1999 520 3
Kenya Airways fatalities 1999 0 277
KLM fatalities 1999 3 625
Korean Air fatalities 1999 425 4
LAN Airlines fatalities 1999 21 48
Lufthansa fatalities 1999 2 1713
Malaysia Airlines fatalities 1999 34 31
Pakistan International fatalities 1999 234 1
Philippine Airlines fatalities 1999 74 6
Qantas fatalities 1999 0 1917
Royal Air Maroc fatalities 1999 51 6
SAS fatalities 1999 0 683
Saudi Arabian fatalities 1999 313 3
Singapore Airlines fatalities 1999 6 396
South African fatalities 1999 159 4
Southwest Airlines fatalities 1999 0 3277
Sri Lankan / AirLanka fatalities 1999 14 23
SWISS fatalities 1999 229 3
TACA fatalities 1999 3 86
TAM fatalities 1999 98 15
TAP - Air Portugal fatalities 1999 0 619
Thai Airways fatalities 1999 308 6
Turkish Airlines fatalities 1999 64 30
United / Continental fatalities 1999 319 22
US Airways / America West fatalities 1999 224 11
Vietnam Airlines fatalities 1999 171 4
Virgin Atlantic fatalities 1999 0 1005
Xiamen Airlines fatalities 1999 82 5
Aer Lingus incident 2014 0 321
Aeroflot incident 2014 6 200
Aerolineas Argentinas incident 2014 1 386
Aeromexico incident 2014 5 119
Air Canada incident 2014 2 933
Air France incident 2014 6 501
Air India incident 2014 4 217
Air New Zealand incident 2014 5 142
Alaska Airlines incident 2014 5 193
Alitalia incident 2014 4 175
All Nippon Airways incident 2014 7 263
American incident 2014 17 308
Austrian Airlines incident 2014 1 358
Avianca incident 2014 0 397
British Airways incident 2014 6 530
Cathay Pacific incident 2014 2 1291
China Airlines incident 2014 2 407
Condor incident 2014 0 418
COPA incident 2014 0 550
Delta / Northwest incident 2014 24 272
Egyptair incident 2014 4 139
El Al incident 2014 1 335
Ethiopian Airlines incident 2014 5 98
Finnair incident 2014 0 506
Garuda Indonesia incident 2014 4 153
Gulf Air incident 2014 3 100
Hawaiian Airlines incident 2014 1 494
Iberia incident 2014 5 235
Japan Airlines incident 2014 0 1574
Kenya Airways incident 2014 2 139
KLM incident 2014 1 1875
Korean Air incident 2014 1 1735
LAN Airlines incident 2014 0 1002
Lufthansa incident 2014 3 1142
Malaysia Airlines incident 2014 3 346
Pakistan International incident 2014 10 35
Philippine Airlines incident 2014 2 207
Qantas incident 2014 5 383
Royal Air Maroc incident 2014 3 99
SAS incident 2014 6 114
Saudi Arabian incident 2014 11 78
Singapore Airlines incident 2014 2 1188
South African incident 2014 1 652
Southwest Airlines incident 2014 8 410
Sri Lankan / AirLanka incident 2014 4 81
SWISS incident 2014 3 264
TACA incident 2014 1 259
TAM incident 2014 7 216
TAP - Air Portugal incident 2014 0 619
Thai Airways incident 2014 2 851
Turkish Airlines incident 2014 8 243
United / Continental incident 2014 14 510
US Airways / America West incident 2014 11 223
Vietnam Airlines incident 2014 1 625
Virgin Atlantic incident 2014 0 1005
Xiamen Airlines incident 2014 2 215
Aer Lingus fatal_accident 2014 0 321
Aeroflot fatal_accident 2014 1 1198
Aerolineas Argentinas fatal_accident 2014 0 386
Aeromexico fatal_accident 2014 0 597
Air Canada fatal_accident 2014 0 1865
Air France fatal_accident 2014 2 1502
Air India fatal_accident 2014 1 869
Air New Zealand fatal_accident 2014 1 710
Alaska Airlines fatal_accident 2014 1 965
Alitalia fatal_accident 2014 0 698
All Nippon Airways fatal_accident 2014 0 1841
American fatal_accident 2014 3 1743
Austrian Airlines fatal_accident 2014 0 358
Avianca fatal_accident 2014 0 397
British Airways fatal_accident 2014 0 3180
Cathay Pacific fatal_accident 2014 0 2582
China Airlines fatal_accident 2014 1 813
Condor fatal_accident 2014 0 418
COPA fatal_accident 2014 0 550
Delta / Northwest fatal_accident 2014 2 3263
Egyptair fatal_accident 2014 1 558
El Al fatal_accident 2014 0 335
Ethiopian Airlines fatal_accident 2014 2 244
Finnair fatal_accident 2014 0 506
Garuda Indonesia fatal_accident 2014 2 307
Gulf Air fatal_accident 2014 1 301
Hawaiian Airlines fatal_accident 2014 0 494
Iberia fatal_accident 2014 0 1173
Japan Airlines fatal_accident 2014 0 1574
Kenya Airways fatal_accident 2014 2 139
KLM fatal_accident 2014 0 1875
Korean Air fatal_accident 2014 0 1735
LAN Airlines fatal_accident 2014 0 1002
Lufthansa fatal_accident 2014 0 3427
Malaysia Airlines fatal_accident 2014 2 520
Pakistan International fatal_accident 2014 2 174
Philippine Airlines fatal_accident 2014 1 413
Qantas fatal_accident 2014 0 1917
Royal Air Maroc fatal_accident 2014 0 296
SAS fatal_accident 2014 1 683
Saudi Arabian fatal_accident 2014 0 860
Singapore Airlines fatal_accident 2014 1 2377
South African fatal_accident 2014 0 652
Southwest Airlines fatal_accident 2014 0 3277
Sri Lankan / AirLanka fatal_accident 2014 0 326
SWISS fatal_accident 2014 0 793
TACA fatal_accident 2014 1 259
TAM fatal_accident 2014 2 755
TAP - Air Portugal fatal_accident 2014 0 619
Thai Airways fatal_accident 2014 1 1703
Turkish Airlines fatal_accident 2014 2 973
United / Continental fatal_accident 2014 2 3570
US Airways / America West fatal_accident 2014 2 1228
Vietnam Airlines fatal_accident 2014 0 625
Virgin Atlantic fatal_accident 2014 0 1005
Xiamen Airlines fatal_accident 2014 0 430
Aer Lingus fatalities 2014 0 321
Aeroflot fatalities 2014 88 14
Aerolineas Argentinas fatalities 2014 0 386
Aeromexico fatalities 2014 0 597
Air Canada fatalities 2014 0 1865
Air France fatalities 2014 337 9
Air India fatalities 2014 158 6
Air New Zealand fatalities 2014 7 101
Alaska Airlines fatalities 2014 88 11
Alitalia fatalities 2014 0 698
All Nippon Airways fatalities 2014 0 1841
American fatalities 2014 416 13
Austrian Airlines fatalities 2014 0 358
Avianca fatalities 2014 0 397
British Airways fatalities 2014 0 3180
Cathay Pacific fatalities 2014 0 2582
China Airlines fatalities 2014 225 4
Condor fatalities 2014 0 418
COPA fatalities 2014 0 550
Delta / Northwest fatalities 2014 51 128
Egyptair fatalities 2014 14 40
El Al fatalities 2014 0 335
Ethiopian Airlines fatalities 2014 92 5
Finnair fatalities 2014 0 506
Garuda Indonesia fatalities 2014 22 28
Gulf Air fatalities 2014 143 2
Hawaiian Airlines fatalities 2014 0 494
Iberia fatalities 2014 0 1173
Japan Airlines fatalities 2014 0 1574
Kenya Airways fatalities 2014 283 1
KLM fatalities 2014 0 1875
Korean Air fatalities 2014 0 1735
LAN Airlines fatalities 2014 0 1002
Lufthansa fatalities 2014 0 3427
Malaysia Airlines fatalities 2014 537 2
Pakistan International fatalities 2014 46 8
Philippine Airlines fatalities 2014 1 413
Qantas fatalities 2014 0 1917
Royal Air Maroc fatalities 2014 0 296
SAS fatalities 2014 110 6
Saudi Arabian fatalities 2014 0 860
Singapore Airlines fatalities 2014 83 29
South African fatalities 2014 0 652
Southwest Airlines fatalities 2014 0 3277
Sri Lankan / AirLanka fatalities 2014 0 326
SWISS fatalities 2014 0 793
TACA fatalities 2014 3 86
TAM fatalities 2014 188 8
TAP - Air Portugal fatalities 2014 0 619
Thai Airways fatalities 2014 1 1703
Turkish Airlines fatalities 2014 84 23
United / Continental fatalities 2014 109 65
US Airways / America West fatalities 2014 23 107
Vietnam Airlines fatalities 2014 0 625
Virgin Atlantic fatalities 2014 0 1005
Xiamen Airlines fatalities 2014 0 430