Qantas loses high level as the world’s safest airline for 2022 are revealed for the first time in eight years

Qantas has lost its title as the world’s safest airline for the first time starting around 2013 because of Covid pilot misfortunes and a ‘serious incident’.

Australia’s flagship airline had a sharp drop in Airline Ratings’ annual safest airline list down to the seventh spot and was supplanted at the top via Air New Zealand.

Qantas was ranked the world’s safest airline from 2014 to 2017 and 2019 to 2021, and no clear winner could be seen as in 2018.

Air New Zealand was followed by two Middle Eastern airlines, Etihad and Qatar. Virgin Australia/Virgin Atlantic is ranked number 10.

The previous year has proved to be yet one more unquestionably troublesome one for airlines as the slump in air travel proceeded all through 2021 because of the effect of the ongoing pandemic.

Indeed, even presently, two years after COVID-19 was first brought to the world’s consideration, there are as yet far fewer flights and travelers taking to the skies.

The virus has additionally kept on dominating discussions around air security, prompting a few huge changes in the annual list of the world’s safest airlines from AirlineRatings.com, airline safety, and product review website.

This year, Air New Zealand has come out on top on the annual safety table, which screens 385 carriers from across the globe, estimating factors, for example, the airlines’ accident and serious incident records, the age of their airplane, as well as COVID-19 protocols and operational innovation.

Airline Ratings checks out 385 carriers across the world, estimating factors including the airlines’ accident and serious incident records, the age of their airplane, and Covid-19 conventions.

Air New Zealand was awarded the current year’s top spot ‘due to its excellent incident record, several cockpit innovations, pilot training, and very low fleet age’, said Geoffrey Thomas, editor-in-chief of the airline safety and product review website.

The average Air New Zealand airplane age is simply 6.8 years and it has been at the forefront of technical safety upgrades.

These incorporate the Future Air Navigation System for the pilot to ground communication and Required Navigation Performance for accuracy approaches around mountains in cloud conditions.

‘Air New Zealand has excelled across the broad safety spectrum never losing sight of the smallest detail while caring for its flight crews who have worked under significant stress,’ Mr. Thomas said.

Airline Ratings said Qantas dropped down the rundown because of a 2018 incident at Perth Airport, which prompted an Australian Safety Transport Bureau examination that was finished in 2020.

The ATSB observed complex issues brought about by a Qantas aircraft landing and navigating towards an alternate runway where another Qantas plane was getting ready to take off.

Air traffic control and the plane’s group became mindful and halted not long before crossing onto the second runway.

The report into that incident was not given until late 2020, past the time to be included in the 2021 safety rankings.

‘The last two years have been extremely difficult for airlines with Covid-19 slashing travel and Airline Ratings editors have particularly focused on the lengths airlines are undertaking to retrain pilots ahead of a service return,’ Mr. Thomas said.

‘Air New Zealand is a leader in this field with comprehensive retraining.’

Air New Zealand’s CEO Greg Foran said the airline was ‘humbled’ to get the acknowledgment.

‘We’re in good company and a big congratulations to all airlines on the list,’ he said.

‘The Air New Zealand promise is to take manaaki (care) further. To do that we have to take our approach to safety further. For us, it’s not about safety first – it’s about safety always. We want everyone to go home safely every day.

‘Throughout the pandemic, the whole Air New Zealand team has been focused on protecting the health and safety of our people, customers, and the wider New Zealand community.

‘We were the first airline in the world to ask our customers flying on our domestic services to either be vaccinated or tested before boarding and come 1 February, will require all customers on our international services to be fully vaccinated too.’

Top ranking

The flag carrier airline for New Zealand was awarded in front of the pack “due to its excellent incident record, several cockpit innovations, pilot training, and very low fleet age,” as indicated by Geoffrey Thomas, editor-in-chief of the Australian-based website.

Etihad Airways took second place, while Qatar Airways came in third, with Singapore Airlines and TAP Portugal accomplishing fourth and fifth spot respectively.

Discernibly absent from the top five is Qantas, which held the title of the world’s safest airline from 2014 to 2017, as well as 2019 to 2021 (no clear winner could be seen as in 2018).

Australia’s flag carrier takes the seventh spot this time due to a “slight increase in incidents coupled with the fleet age.”

In October 2021, a Qantas Boeing going from the Australian city of Perth to Adelaide in Western Australia was redirected because of a fuel lopsidedness, in an event named a “serious incident”.

“The last two years have been extremely difficult for airlines with COVID-19 slashing travel and Airline Ratings editors have particularly focused on the lengths airlines are undertaking to retrain pilots ahead of a service return,” explains Mr. Thomas.

“Air New Zealand is a leader in this field with comprehensive retraining.”

Safety advancements
The airline also received praise for being a world leader in operational safety advancements throughout recent many years.

Its different drives remember as of late become one of the main carriers for the world to preliminary the utilization of Assaia Apron AI technology to further develop its aircraft turn times.

“Air New Zealand has excelled across the broad safety spectrum never losing sight of the smallest detail while caring for its flight crews who have worked under significant stress,” Mr. Thomas tells CNN Travel.

On certain events, AirlineRatings has decided to just name its winner, before listing the rest of the top airlines alphabetically.

But the website has recently opted to rank each of the top 20 airlines in numerical order, revealing some significant movement from year to year.

For example, Emirates was at number five on the 2021 list, but the UAE airline has been listed at 20th place this year, while Southwest Airlines was ranked 13th in 2021, yet is excluded from the new top 20 for 2022.

AirlineRatings.com has likewise delivered a rundown of the world’s most secure spending plan carriers, which are recorded sequentially as they are positioned similarly, indeed.

The best 10 safest low-cost airlines are: Allegiant Air, easyJet, Frontier Airlines, Jetstar Group, Jetblue, Ryanair, Vietjet Air, Vietjet Air, Volaris, Westjet and Wizz Air.

AirlineRatings.com’s most secure airlines for 2022:

1. Air New Zealand
2. Etihad Airways
3. Qatar Airways
4. Singapore Airlines
5. TAP Air Portugal
6. SAS
7. Qantas
8. Alaska Airlines
9. EVA Air
10. Virgin Australia/Virgin Atlantic
11. Cathay Pacific Airways
12. Hawaiian Airlines
13. American Airlines
14. Lufthansa
15. Finnair
16. KLM
17. British Airways
18. Delta Air Lines
19. United Airlines
20. Emirates