Fatalities: Rentals vs Owned?

While discussing flight safety in a different thread, the idea popped
into my head that rental planes are probably more dangerous to fly than
owner-flown aircraft. In my case, some of the rental birds I used to
fly were down-right scary, and I know that they were often abused and
ignored.

This as opposed to my own aircraft, which have been meticulously
maintained and pampered. (And, other than the hangar queens that are
owned by "pilots" that never fly, every active pilot owner I know
treats their plane in much the same way.)

Strangely, I can't seem to find any statistics on this seemingly
obvious (and easy-to-compile) issue. Does anyone know if any studies
have been done in this regard?
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

NTSB reports do not reflect the ownership status, only the FAR under which
the flight was being conducted. But you knew that.

Bob Gardner

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
ups.com...
While discussing flight safety in a different thread, the idea popped
into my head that rental planes are probably more dangerous to fly than
owner-flown aircraft. In my case, some of the rental birds I used to
fly were down-right scary, and I know that they were often abused and
ignored.

This as opposed to my own aircraft, which have been meticulously
maintained and pampered. (And, other than the hangar queens that are
owned by "pilots" that never fly, every active pilot owner I know
treats their plane in much the same way.)

Strangely, I can't seem to find any statistics on this seemingly
obvious (and easy-to-compile) issue. Does anyone know if any studies
have been done in this regard?
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Jay Honeck wrote:
While discussing flight safety in a different thread, the idea popped
into my head that rental planes are probably more dangerous to fly than
owner-flown aircraft. In my case, some of the rental birds I used to
fly were down-right scary, and I know that they were often abused and
ignored.

Interesting. I don't have any studies, but from a strictly maintenance
standpoint, I see things completely opposite. Every single rental
aircraft I have flown is meticulously maintained, by certificated and
qualified mechanics with factory training. I'm picky about what I fly.

Some of the owners I know? They just go out and do whatever to their
airplanes, legal/safe or not. It's the "it's my plane, I can do what I
want to it" mentality.

On Oct 21, 7:31 pm, Emily wrote:
Interesting. I don't have any studies, but from a strictly maintenance
standpoint, I see things completely opposite. Every single rental
aircraft I have flown is meticulously maintained, by certificated and
qualified mechanics with factory training. I'm picky about what I fly.

Some of the owners I know? They just go out and do whatever to their
airplanes, legal/safe or not. It's the "it's my plane, I can do what I
want to it" mentality.

I'd agree. I've flown plenty of rental and "Working" planes, and while
they are ugly to look at (torn up interiors, chipped paint, etc.) they
tend to be generally well maintained underneath. Required 100 hour
inspections mean that cables, spars, etc. are getting looked at as much
as once a month or two rather than once a year. My experience has been
that Owner/pilots are more likely to cut corners on maintenance issues
that they do not see as a safety issue.

The reality is however, that maintenance induce accidents are
relatively rare. If there is a statistic significant increase in the
accident rate for rentals, its likely due to the comparably less
proficiency that renters have compared to owners. I'd venture to guess
that in the broad scheme of things, the accident rate for rentals is
likely lower as high insurance rates and renter requirements discourage
flight schools from putting more accident-prone aircraft on the rental
line.

Jay Honeck wrote:
Strangely, I can't seem to find any statistics on this seemingly
obvious (and easy-to-compile) issue. Does anyone know if any studies
have been done in this regard?


I don't know of any statistically valid studies. From my own experience, I
believe the local fatalities have been 3:1 owners to renters. My pet theory is
that it has to do with more exposure as an owner. Renters tend to fly less.

As an aside, I don't recall any of the local GA fatalities were caused by
mechanical deficiencies. They seemed to be either weather or health related
instead.



--
Mortimer Schnerd, RN
mschnerdatcarolina.rr.com

Jay Honeck wrote:
Strangely, I can't seem to find any statistics on this seemingly
obvious (and easy-to-compile) issue. Does anyone know if any studies
have been done in this regard?

it might actually be difficult to make comparisons because I would
guess -- i.e., this is not based on any numbers/evidences, just
wild speculations -- that privately owned aircraft are used quite
differently from rentals; for instance, I would imagine that
the former are used more for travels and the latter more for
training for instance...

--Sylvain

Mortimer Schnerd, RN wrote:
Jay Honeck wrote:
Strangely, I can't seem to find any statistics on this seemingly
obvious (and easy-to-compile) issue. Does anyone know if any studies
have been done in this regard?


I don't know of any statistically valid studies. From my own experience, I
believe the local fatalities have been 3:1 owners to renters. My pet theory is
that it has to do with more exposure as an owner. Renters tend to fly less.

Yes, a renter might fly less, but what about a rental aircraft?

On 21 Oct 2006 15:45:58 -0700, "Jay Honeck" wrote:

While discussing flight safety in a different thread, the idea popped
into my head that rental planes are probably more dangerous to fly than
owner-flown aircraft. In my case, some of the rental birds I used to
fly were down-right scary, and I know that they were often abused and
ignored.

This as opposed to my own aircraft, which have been meticulously
maintained and pampered. (And, other than the hangar queens that are
owned by "pilots" that never fly, every active pilot owner I know
treats their plane in much the same way.)

Strangely, I can't seem to find any statistics on this seemingly
obvious (and easy-to-compile) issue. Does anyone know if any studies
have been done in this regard?

It's not that easy to compile accurately, I think. The NTSB accident summaries
do include the owner and operator names, and has a "Oper_same" column, but
there's no way to really tell the relationship of the pilot to the owner. If
the pilot was "Joe Smith" and the owner is listed as "ABC Investments," was the
plane rented or did the pilot just operate it as a corporation for tax purposes?
If the "Oper_Same" flag is "N", was it rented or was it borrowed from a friend?

Certainly there are some owners who keep their airplanes in much better shape
than the average rental hack. But then, there are owners who cut corners and
defer repairs.

I have run a couple of analyses of NTSB data to investigate homebuilt aircraft
accident statistics. For these, I use a combination of Cessna 172s/210s as a
control group (leaving out the 172s involved in training accidents). During the
2002-2004 period, about 20% of the 172/210 group accidents were due to some sort
of mechanical problem, including faulty maintenance. But a third of those were
"unexplained engine failures" that might have been due to the pilot.

All boiled down, between 70% and 80% of the accidents had nothing to do with who
actually owned the airplane...the pilot goofed up. Perhaps some of the
remainder crashed because they were rental birds in poor condition, but the raw
number is not likely to be statistically significant. Convincing pilots to NOT
run their gas tanks dry would save more lives than tightening FBO maintenance
oversight.

It's interesting to note that I've seen the same argument made for
homebuilts...that homebuilt owners take better care of their airplanes. The
statistics don't bear that out. Homebuilts (which, it must be pointed out, are
generally manufactured *and* maintained by amateurs) have a mechanical-failure
accident rate about 50% higher than my C-172/210 control group.

Ron Wanttaja

This is a tough one Jay. I don't have figure 1 on this, but from personal
experience through the years I've seen it both ways. I've seen operations
that maintained their airplanes like a Swiss watch and many I wouldn't touch
with a 10 foot pole. I've seen owners who maintained perfectly and owners
whose airplanes I absolutely would not fly.
I think a useful and plausible answer to this one is going to be tough to
nail down.
Dudley

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
ups.com...
While discussing flight safety in a different thread, the idea popped
into my head that rental planes are probably more dangerous to fly than
owner-flown aircraft. In my case, some of the rental birds I used to
fly were down-right scary, and I know that they were often abused and
ignored.

This as opposed to my own aircraft, which have been meticulously
maintained and pampered. (And, other than the hangar queens that are
owned by "pilots" that never fly, every active pilot owner I know
treats their plane in much the same way.)

Strangely, I can't seem to find any statistics on this seemingly
obvious (and easy-to-compile) issue. Does anyone know if any studies
have been done in this regard?
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

On Sat, 21 Oct 2006 17:27:47 -0700, Brad wrote:

I'd agree. I've flown plenty of rental and "Working" planes, and while
they are ugly to look at (torn up interiors, chipped paint, etc.) they
tend to be generally well maintained underneath. Required 100 hour
inspections mean that cables, spars, etc. are getting looked at as much as
once a month or two rather than once a year. My experience has been that
Owner/pilots are more likely to cut corners on maintenance issues that
they do not see as a safety issue.

I'd say that the bag is mixed on both sides. During my PPL training, the
aircraft were in a state that would - had I known what I know now - worry
me. It's very possible that all the flaws I saw were all there were to
see, and that the actual underlying MX was flawless. But how would I know?

Another FBO on the same field had newer and better maintained airplanes.
On the other hand, how do I know that all the effort wasn't spent on
keeping the plane looking good, with corners cut underneath? I don't.

Still, I could easily see one shop taking MX more seriously than the
other. Sure, the rentals are required to have 100 hour inspections. But,
as far as I recall, there's no requirement for (for example) oil analysis.
So there's room for "good MX" and "bad MX".

I'm sensitive to that at the moment as that analysis just told us of a
possible problem in one engine in the partnership to which I belong. The
question arose: were we safer in that airplane (where all MX people,
including Mattituck, said that the proper response was to fly it for 15
hours and then recheck, but for one A&P who said that the
200-hour-over-TBO engine should be overhauled immediately) or in a rental
airplane that wasn't given oil analysis.

After all, if we did do the analysis we'd not know about the copper in the
oil. So who can tell about the engines on the rental fleet?

- Andrew