The Relationship between General Aviation Pilot Age and Accident Rate

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to assess the relationship between the number of accidents and pilot’s age. The pilot considered for this study is General Aviation Pilot. Normal distribution of the accidents shows the mean pilot’s age = 54.60 with S. Dage = 14.38. There is a non-linear relationship between pilot’s age and accident rate and there is a significant difference in accidents across the age intervals F(19, 234) = 9.3116, p < 0.0001. There is no statistical difference in the number of accidents between the interval 40-70 age group. Also, there is statistical difference in the number of accidents above and below 60-year age with respect to event severity and cause of accident (Wiki’s lemma= 0.36, F(26, 160) = 4.00, p < 0.0001). The follow up shows that the number of fatal and non-fatal accidents were statistically different for both above F(2, 92) = 4.58, p < 0.0127 and for below F(2,129) = 7.2, p < 0.0011 while the number of accidents with respect to its causes above 60 are not statistically different but there is statistical difference (F = (5, 126) = 8.74, p < 0.0001) in the number of accidents caused by pilot and caused by technical fault or weather/wind in the age group below 60.