Passport to Death
By Rod
Eime
Life is one of those things you miss most when it's gone.
Travel is something Australians rather do for enjoyment, but
end up doing mainly for work.
If we knew the real dangers of travel, would we be more likely
to invite the neighbours over for scrabble and telecommute
instead?
Our lives are too often limited by our fears. We all know
someone who is too afraid to fly. Others are too petrified
to even leave their homes, the notion of travel only coming
under "Verne, Jules".
If we pay too much attention to the graphic evening news,
we could believe that anything other than a quick and careful
stroll to the corner shop in broad daylight is purely suicidal.
Sure, life's a risk, but what are the real risks of taking
a holiday or business trip?
Let's look at the major travel dangers and their relative
risks. Then we'll compare these with what we do around the
home and at work - and you can make up your own mind.
Airline Crashes
These tend to make a big impression on us when they splash
onto the TV news. They're always messy and very, very fatal.
Horror movies and small screen dramas do nothing to enhance
our comfort with these kerosene-powered, airborne behemoths,
so let's put this fear into perspective.
Your chances of surviving an aeroplane crash aren't any better
than 50/50, even though you're very unlikely to be involved
in one - typically 1:3.7 million if you fly top-shelf airlines.
Official US figures indicate a death rate of just .01 per
billion passenger miles.
Another British study shows that flying is 176 times safer
than walking, 15 times safer than driving and 300 times safer
than a motorbike.
However, when you re-analyse these figures and display them
according to hours exposed to a form of transport, cars and
planes are about equal. Buses and trains, interestingly, are
substantially safer under this method.
Location and carrier are critical in determining how likely
you are to arrive at your destination intact. CIS (ex-Soviet)
airlines, of which there are now over 300, are the worst with
a death rate ten times the global average. Africa and Asia,
in that order, are the most dangerous places to fly, with
South and Central America little better.
Robert Young Pelton advises in his best selling book, 'The
World's Most Dangerous Places', that you're best to avoid
local carriers in China, North Korea, Colombia, all Central
African countries and the former Soviet Union (CIS). Regardless
of location; the smaller the plane, the higher the risk.
Trains, Buses and Automobiles
 Even
though you are much more likely to be involved in a ground
level mishap, your chances of survival are better.
We are constantly reminded about the dangers of personal
vehicular transport, in particular the deadly ingredients
of booze and bravado.
If you think it's bad here, you'll be absolutely mortified
at the figures coming from some countries.
Look at studies performed by such groups as the IRF, NSC,
and ASIRT, and in some places, you wouldn't get in a car for
quids.
Egypt, for one, has a death rate of 43.2 per 100 million
kilometres driven. Other countries where motoring is more
a way of death than way of life are Kenya (36), South Korea
(29), Turkey (22) and Morocco (21).
We might reckon the USA is the capital of death-on-wheels,
but it actually rates very well under this method, at just
1.1, which is why you see this method quoted more there than
anywhere else. Scandinavians take their safety seriously too,
with similar ratings for each country there.
Playing with statistics can be fun. Let's see who comes up
trumps when we measure deaths per 100,000 of population. Statisticians
call this the 'risk'. The winner: Malaysia at 31. South Korea
(30.4), Portugal (28.1) and South Africa (26.5) all get a
guernsey with Brazil, Hungary and Greece, each in the 22s,
worth a dishonorable mention.
Popular destinations for Aussie travellers like New Zealand
(19.5) and USA (18.4) don't scrub up too well either in this
light. Compare this to our national figure of just 9.3.
While we're on a mathematical twist, we might as well look
at the other key indicator used, namely the 'fatality rate'.
This is derived from stiffs per 10,000 registered vehicles.
Even though only about 50-odd people check out each year in
the Central African Republic, it tops the scale at over 300.
Africans have a serious death wish because Ethiopia and Malawi
each chalk up nearly 200, while Tanzania, Botswana and Guinea
all crack the 'ton'. Outside of the continent, Bangladesh
(45), Kyrgyzstan (41), Syria, Burma (36) and China (26) also
put their relatively few vehicles to very efficient use. Compare:
Australia (1.8), USA (2.0), UK (1.5), Ireland (3.4) and NZ
(2.2).
As a general guide, countries (usually developing ones) with
lots of people and relatively few cars have blood-curdling
fatality rates (20+) as cavalier drivers try to assert their
mechanical superiority over lowly pedestrians and cyclists
on shithouse roads.
Conversely, a country with a staggering 'rate' can still
boast a low 'risk'. We call that 'safety in numbers'. Two
forms of wheeled transport feature particularly highly in
studies of road deaths - one, the motorcycle, and two, the
minibus. The motorcycle in particular is the fastest means
of transport to heaven, or hell as the case may be.
Factors like poor road conditions, unfamiliar local traffic
"customs" and a hearty disregard for personal safety
add to near zero life expectancy once you climb aboard one
of these two-wheeled deathtraps. About ten Australians will
throw their lives away each year by this means.
The minibus, according to Robert Young Pelton (RYP) is "the
most dangerous form of travel in the world." He argues
that because these largely unregulated vehicles are run by
largely unregulated entrepreneurs in similarly regulated countries,
motor mayhem is unavoidable.
These overloaded, overworked, undersized Japanese buzzboxes
roar through crowded streets while their owners (or hirers)
try to maximise their returns with scant regard for the bodycount.
According to RYP, "in South Africa 60,000 accidents
involving minibuses kill more than 900 people every year and
375 pedestrians were killed by the 30,000 or so minivans in
Lima, Peru." The fare may be cheap, but so is life when
you get into one of these pressed-metal caskets.
Between thirty and forty Australians will die overseas each
year as a result of some form of road-induced trauma, which,
when you calculate per 100,000 travellers, equals a trifling
1.3.
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