January 21, 2025
OUT WITH the old. As it happened, 2024 closed on a sour note, with two major crashes in the span of a week, capping what was, statistically, one of the deadliest years in some time.
Maybe so, but how deadly, exactly? Compare last year to many of the years of the 1970’s and 1980’s, when multiple major crashes were the norm. Suddenly 2024 doesn’t look so bad. Fact is, year over year, we have nowhere near the number of serious accidents we used to.
Just the same, it’s tempting to view 2024 as a correction, rather than an aberration. Perhaps what was surprising wasn’t the spate of accidents, but rather how long we’d gone without such a spate. Maybe we were too lucky for too long.
There’s no telling what might happen in 2025. If nothing else, let’s hope the U.S. majors maintain their remarkable streak of disaster-free years, currently standing at 23.
In the meantime, who’s next in line for a computer crash? The “airline meltdown” has become a recurrent event — a revolving series of tech-related fiascos. Every few months, it seems, things at one of the big carriers go haywire for a few days. Last summer, Delta had its fifteen minutes of infamy. More recently it was American. Is it United’s turn? Southwest? JetBlue?
Other predictions are easier. The unrelenting tedium of TSA, for instance. No changes there. You’ve been standing in line for the past two decades, mostly for no good reason. And you’ll be standing again.
Things have gotten a little better with delays and cancellations, as airlines have reduced their dependence on regional jets and rationalized their schedules. Somewhat. But the skies remain overcrowded, and ATC remains understaffed and underfunded. So I don’t foresee much improvement.
What else? Bankrupcties? Mergers? Will Spirit Airlines hang in there, or will they disappear under Chapter 7 or a last-minute acquisition? How about a new black swan event, akin to the COVID surprise of 2020?
Who knows. I don’t really see any markers. Nothing feels likely. And maybe that’s good. Perhaps a boring 2025 is what we should hope for.
Feel free to leave your own prognostications in the comments section.
Photo courtesy of Unsplash
