Just because something is outside of your personal knowledge or experience doesn’t mean it’s wrong.
just because you saw cool picture on the internet does not mean you have personal knowledge. i actually do have some knowledge, which is why i reacted.
in 2025, there were 300056 (three hundred thousand) pilots with either cpl or atpl - these are pilots legally allowed to accept reward for piloting a plane.
so it would seem that the tabloid story in usa today drawing some conclusion out of 37k “workers” - roughly 8 times smaller number, has very loose connection to reality.
I openly said you can take issue with the data collection, but the link makes clear they’re talking about specific commercial pilots. My understanding is that the cpl and atpl do not expire. I have no idea how many of those people are in the workforce anymore, or in aviation at all, much less the specific segment in question.
Even if you took that stat and spread it over all of aviation it’d still be more than cops, but just for fun here’s an article using data from the bureau of labor and statistics. They happen to link pilots with flight engineers, but the pattern still holds:
https://usafacts.org/articles/how-many-police-officers-die-in-the-line-of-duty/
You can disagree with whatever data collection or collation you want, but acting like the meme is misleading seems disingenuous, especially when you consider the brevity of the format.
I openly said you can take issue with the data collection
thank you for your permission. my issue is more with studying small subset of the data carefully chosen to support your theory and then presenting it as if it applied to the whole group.
but the link makes clear
the link makes it anything but clear. it ultimately admits that the sample is manipulated, but doesn’t say how and why.
Even if you took that stat and spread it over all of aviation it’d still be more than cops
just because you saw cool picture on the internet does not mean you have personal knowledge. i actually do have some knowledge, which is why i reacted.
in 2025, there were 300056 (three hundred thousand) pilots with either cpl or atpl - these are pilots legally allowed to accept reward for piloting a plane.
so it would seem that the tabloid story in usa today drawing some conclusion out of 37k “workers” - roughly 8 times smaller number, has very loose connection to reality.
I openly said you can take issue with the data collection, but the link makes clear they’re talking about specific commercial pilots. My understanding is that the cpl and atpl do not expire. I have no idea how many of those people are in the workforce anymore, or in aviation at all, much less the specific segment in question.
Even if you took that stat and spread it over all of aviation it’d still be more than cops, but just for fun here’s an article using data from the bureau of labor and statistics. They happen to link pilots with flight engineers, but the pattern still holds: https://usafacts.org/articles/how-many-police-officers-die-in-the-line-of-duty/
You can disagree with whatever data collection or collation you want, but acting like the meme is misleading seems disingenuous, especially when you consider the brevity of the format.
thank you for your permission. my issue is more with studying small subset of the data carefully chosen to support your theory and then presenting it as if it applied to the whole group.
the link makes it anything but clear. it ultimately admits that the sample is manipulated, but doesn’t say how and why.
it would be more than “no data”? 😂
https://hostux.pics/images/2026/08/25/Screenshot-from-2026-08-25-14-27-0984d2800ddf65be81.png
one number manipulated, one non-existent, but the conclusion is one is bigger than the other?
the “meme” is tabloid trash. brevity of the format is not an excuse, no one forced the author to present misleading data.
10800 forestry workers in the us in 2024: https://www.bls.gov/ooh/farming-fishing-and-forestry/forest-and-conservation-workers.htm 53 deaths (https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cfoi.t03.htm) = a death rate of about .5%, 1 in 200.
826,800 police workers in the us in 2024: https://www.bls.gov/ooh/protective-service/police-and-detectives.htm
132 deaths (https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cfoi.t03.htm) = a death rate of about .02%, less than 1 in 2,000.
Edit math and spelling, but check for yourself. Still the difference in magnitude is obvious and always has been.
cool, but that doesn’t really address my complain about pilots. i don’t trust these numbers.
It is on the same website. Not always the same year.
Working pilots: https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/cwc/flying-too-high-workers-fatalities-in-the-aeronautics-field.pdf
80.5 per 100k/ year
Police: https://www.bls.gov/iif/factsheets/fatal-occupational-injuries-police-2018.htm
13.7 per 100k/year
No matter what year you find stats for, pilots outweigh police for death risk. Prove me wrong.