Insights from the records
Aggregate views of the data GroundCheck republishes: NTSB accidents since 1982, probable-cause findings, pilot experience from accident dockets, and FAA maintenance-report volume.
Every percentage on this page is a share of accidents that already happened, not a rate: the public records carry no exposure denominator (flights or fleet hours), so nothing here measures how likely a flight is to crash. And nothing here is per-operator — GroundCheck does not rate, rank, or score anyone.
The long view: accidents have halved since the 1980s
US civil aviation accidents fell from about 3,364 a year in the early 1980s to about 1,474 in recent years (1982–2025), and fatal accidents fell in step, from about 634 to 285. Nearly all fatal accidents are Part 91 general aviation. Charter (Part 135) fatal accidents went from about 32 a year to 7; scheduled airlines (Part 121) are at zero in most years.
What the NTSB finds as probable cause
Across 4,778 fatal accidents with final reports (2005–2023), the largest category by far is loss of control / stall — 33% of findings. Maintenance-related findings are a small minority at 1.3%. Categories are keyword matches on the NTSB's own probable-cause wording, first match wins, so treat the boundaries as soft.
Pilot experience in the accident record
Among 21,959 pilots-in-command in accidents since 2000, the share of accidents that are fatal rises with career hours — 13.5% under 100 hours, peaking at 19.1% around 1–2.5k hours — higher-hour pilots fly harder missions (night, weather, terrain). Recency cuts the other way: pilots who had not flown at all in the preceding 90 days show a 31.9% fatal share, versus 6.9–8.8% for pilots with any recent time.
Maintenance reporting is growing — that's reporting, not risk
Service Difficulty Report filing is largely voluntary below air-carrier level, so volume tracks reporting culture and fleet size, not aircraft condition. Diligent operators file more, not fewer. Across all 1,860 Part 135 operators with an active linked fleet, 77% filed no reports at all in the last five years — any filing mostly means an operator participates in the reporting system. (Rates compare five years of reports against each operator's current fleet, and filing under a second designator counts as none — read the shape, not the decimals.)
The charts on this page are interactive: each year links into that year's accident and incident records.