The A340's crazy record: after more than 30 years of service, Airbus' four-engine aircraft is still in the 'zero club'

The Airbus A340 is not the latest in technological evolution and consumption. It is an aircraft that dates back to the early 1990s, that is, more than 30 years ago.

And Lufthansa, the airline with the most of them in its fleet (23), is keeping them in active service by continuing to postpone their retirement date, just because he has no arei to replace them with, due to the monstrous delay in Boeing 777-9 deliveries and the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration's failure to certify the Allegris Business Class cabin installed on 15 brand-new Boeing 787-9s but still stuck in the U.S. awaiting FAA clearance.

However, it is a plane still highly valued for its comfort by passengers (despite the fact that the booths are now quite dated) and even more so by aviation enthusiasts, who love its four engines, a factor the A340s share only with the Boeing 747-8 and Airbus A380.

Four-engines have always been seen as an added safety guarantee, especially on long-haul flights involving overflying oceans, before the latest generation of thrusters (such as those mounted on the A330neo, Boeing 777, and Boeing 787) proved so reliable that four-engines (except for the A380) were simply too expensive for the ratio of fuel consumption to cargo capacity.

But from a report released by Boeing last April uncovers another 'wow factor' of the Airbus A340. A real record: in the thirty-odd years that Airbus' four-engine aircraft (in its -200, -300 and -600 versions) have been in service, there has been no loss of an aircraft as a result of an accident with at least one fatality on board.

The record recorded in Boeing's table, which shows the rate of accidents involving loss of the airplane and at least one fatality on board per million takeoffs, is even more remarkable when one considers that 377 were delivered to airlines between 1993 and 2011, and that the A340 has also flown and is flying for companies based in continents that are not exactly zero-risk when it comes to air travel, such as South America, Africa, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia.

To date, its main users are Germany's Lufthansa (8 A340-600s and 16 A340-300s), Iran's Mahan Air (5A340-600, 9 A340-300 and 1 A340-200), the Venezuelan Conviasa (3 A340-600, 1 A340-300 and 2 A340-200), the Swiss Swiss (4 A340-300s) and the Afghan Kam Air (4 A340-300).

Boeing's report reveals five other aircraft models that have never suffered aircraft losses with at least one casualty (the so-called 'zero club'): these are the Airbus A380, Airbus A330neo, Airbus A220, Boeing 717 and Boeing 747-8.

Until a few weeks ago, the Bombardier CRJ (but in January, one of American Eagle's crashed in Washington DC) and the Boeing 787 (before In Ahmedabad if an Air India one crashes.).

The aircraft models still in service that, conversely, have the worst accident rate per million takeoffs are the Boeing 737 MAX (0.41), the Airbus A300-600 (0.53), the Boeing 747-400 (0.54), the Airbus A350 (0.59(, the Airbus A300 (0.63), the Boeing 727 (0.72), the Boeing 737-100 and -200 (0.87), and the Airbus A310 (1.89).

How much flying on aircraft in service today (more or less technologically advanced) is infinitely safer than traveling on those of earlier generations, now no longer in service, is shown by the 'rate' provided by Boeing, which is 3.04 aircraft destroyed in accidents with at least one fatality per million takeoffs.

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