We’ve all been asked, “Isn’t flying little airplanes risky?” And we all have our own answers. If you’ve been using the old chestnut, “It’s safer than driving to the airport,” then you’ve been cheating, at least a little bit. No, statistically, flying light aircraft is much riskier than driving a car. But it is true that if you eliminate the highly preventable primary causes of flying accidents — flight into bad weather, buzzing and maybe a couple more — you probably can make the case that it’s statistically pretty safe.
I was mentally distilling the concept of “risk” the other day, and it occurred to me that there are three basic elements that combine to form the risk matrix. It’s a three-legged stool, involving 1. The magnitude of damage that could be incurred; 2. The likelihood that the worst of outside elements will, indeed, conspire against us; and 3. The level of skill required to counter those elements (and the realistic assessment of whether or not we have that level of skill available, at that particular time). For example: walking a narrow, straight line isn’t particularly difficult, and the likelihood of outside forces (A strong gust of wind? A push from some wiseguy?) intervening are pretty small. But it makes a huge difference if you’re trying to walk along a four-inch-high curb stone, or along a steel girder at a construction site, 60 stories up.
