Passengers should sit in the safest seats on a plane to survive a crash, experts say

Those who sit in the back seats of an airplane may have a better chance of surviving a plane crash, according to experts.

However, no “magical safer seat” exists, claimed one engineering professional.

When assessing the probability of surviving a plane crash, investigators look at five things: the integrity of the plane, the effectiveness of safety restraints, the gravitational forces (or G-forces) experienced by passengers and crew, the environment inside the plane, and post-crash factors such as sh. like fire or smoke, the Wall Street Journal reported.

A crash is considered “survivable” by the National Transportation Safety Board if the forces transmitted to the passengers do not exceed the limits of human tolerance and if the structure of the aircraft remains largely intact. A crash is unsurvivable when the G-forces are so great that the body cannot withstand it.

When Jeju Air Flight 2216 crashed at Muan International Airport in South Korea in December, the plane exploded in a massive fireball, killing all but two of the 181 passengers.

The survivors were two flight attendants, a 33-year-old man and a 25-year-old woman – who were seated in the rear of the plane, which was the only recognizable part of the plane left intact.

Days before the Jeju Air Flight crash, an Azerbaijan Airlines flight crashed in Kazakhstan on Wednesday, killing at least 38 of the 67 people on board.

All the survivors were seated in the back of the plane.

However, many factors come into play.

“There are many reasons why someone might survive what appears to be a completely unsurvivable situation,” Barbara Dunn, president of the International Association of Air Safety Investigators, told the Journal.

“It is affected depending on how the plane lands and where a passenger is sitting. If you have your seat belt on, this limits the amount of impact the body goes through. It also depends on whether a passenger is able to take a holding position.â€

If a plane crashes nose first, the passengers in the front will have the biggest impact — but sitting in the back of the plane isn’t the only factor that determines whether someone will survive a plane crash.

“A lot of people think it’s safer in the back than the front,” Dunn said. “Not necessarily. How quickly the fire takes over and how quickly you can get to an exit, all of these things also matter.â€

“When you hear survivors, you’d think people survived, and when you hear non-survivors, you’d think everybody died,” Anthony T. Brickhouse, an expert in aerospace safety and a professor at Embry-Riddle. Aeronautical University, told the WSJ.

“We’ve had people survive what we’ll call unsurvivable crashes, and we’ve also had people die in what we’ll call survivable crashes.”

According to data compiled by the Flight Safety Foundation, an international nonprofit organization that provides safety guidance, there have been only 17 other crashes in the past eight decades where a plane carrying 80 or more passengers had one or two survivors.

In January 2024, Japan Airlines evacuated hundreds of passengers before the airframe burst into flames following a collision with another aircraft during landing.

TRT World reported that 2024 saw a grim increase in fatal aircraft accidents for the global aviation industry – compared to 2023, which was deemed the “safest year ever in aviation” with zero fatalities recorded in major crashes of passenger aircraft.

The good news is that “the vast majority of plane crashes are survivable, and most people in crashes survive,” Ed Galea, a professor of fire safety engineering who has conducted historical studies of crash evacuations, recently told CNN of planes.

But “there is no magic safer seat,” he added.

“It depends on the nature of the accident you’re in. Sometimes it’s better in the front, sometimes in the back