Private jet accident statistics

“Private jet” is not a category in the official accident data. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) counts accidents by the rules a flight was operated under, and divides them by flight hours that the FAA estimates. This page sets out what those tables show for charter, airlines and general aviation over twenty years, what they cannot tell you, and what the regulators say changes the risk.

For what is known about the Learjet 60 accident in Palm Beach County on November 1, 2026, see our explainer on the NTSB investigation.

The short version

• Charter airplanes: 0.65 accidents per 100,000 hours in 2024. That is on-demand Part 135 fixed-wing flying, from the NTSB’s Table 17. The fatal accident rate was 0.06.
• Airlines are lower, general aviation far higher. Scheduled airlines had 0.16 accidents and no fatal accidents per 100,000 hours in 2024; general aviation had 4.53 and 0.72.
• No official rate exists for business jets alone. The charter airplane figure includes turboprops and piston aircraft. Jets flew about 65% of its hours in 2024.
• The trend is down for airplanes. Charter airplanes went from 1.81 accidents per 100,000 hours in 2005 to 0.65 in 2024. One year can move a lot, because it rests on a few dozen accidents.
• New rules are coming. Every Part 135 operator must have an FAA-accepted safety management system by May 28, 2027.

How often do private jets have accidents?

Rarely, measured per hour flown, but the official figures cover broader groups than jets. The closest official measure for charter jets is the NTSB’s on-demand Part 135 fixed-wing table: in 2024 it recorded 21 accidents, 2 of them fatal, in about 3.24 million flight hours. That is 0.65 accidents and 0.06 fatal accidents per 100,000 hours. Three people died in those accidents.

Over the ten years 2015 to 2024, the same category had 245 accidents, 44 of them fatal, in about 27.7 million hours: 0.88 accidents and 0.16 fatal accidents per 100,000 hours, by our totals from the NTSB tables. The ten-year figure is steadier than any single year.

The NTSB’s tables, all per 100,000 flight hours:

Kind of flying	Accidents, 2024	Fatal accidents, 2024	Rate, 2024	Fatal rate, 2024	Rate, 2015 to 2024
Scheduled airlines (Part 121)	30	0	0.16	0	0.15
On-demand charter, airplanes (Part 135)	21	2	0.65	0.06	0.88
On-demand charter, helicopters (Part 135)	15	4	1.59	0.42	1.28
General aviation (Part 91)	1,126	182	4.53	0.72	5.40

Most published figures for “charter” use the combined on-demand number (0.86 in 2024), which includes helicopters, air ambulances and tour flights. The NTSB splits airplanes and helicopters in Tables 17 and 20, and the split matters: in 2024 the helicopter rate was more than twice the airplane rate.

Is there an official accident rate for business jets?

No. The NTSB does not publish one, and we found no current official source that does. The FAA’s activity survey estimates hours by engine type: turbojets flew about 2.1 million of the 3.24 million on-demand charter airplane hours in 2024, or about 65%. But the survey does not count accidents, and the NTSB tables do not separate jets from turboprops and piston aircraft, so the two cannot be combined into a jet-only rate without inventing one.

That matters because a figure of “0.1 to 0.3 fatal accidents per 100,000 hours for business jets” circulates on broker websites and in AI-generated answers. We could not trace it to an NTSB table. If someone quotes you a rate, ask which table and which year it comes from.

Trade press keeps counts rather than rates. AIN’s preliminary worldwide tally found 13 fatal business jet accidents and 57 deaths in 2025, against 8 fatal accidents and 21 deaths in 2024. Those are counts, without the hours flown, and they cover every country.

What is the fatality rate, and how is it different?

A fatal accident rate counts accidents in which at least one person died. It is not the number of deaths. In 2024 on-demand charter airplanes had 2 fatal accidents, in which 3 people died; general aviation had 182 fatal accidents and 305 deaths. Many published comparisons mix the two measures, or compare a fatal accident rate with a death rate, which makes one side look several times better or worse than it is.

Has private flying become safer over time?

For airplanes, yes. The chart below shows twenty years of NTSB rates. Charter airplanes fell from 1.81 accidents per 100,000 hours in 2005 to 0.65 in 2024, and general aviation from 7.20 to 4.53. Charter helicopters did not fall over the same period.

The order has not changed in twenty years: in every year with published rates, the airlines are lowest, general aviation is highest, and charter is between them. Charter numbers move a lot from year to year: the fatal accident rate for charter airplanes was 0.03 in 2022 and 0.19 in 2023, a difference of a handful of accidents.

What kinds of accidents happen in charter airplanes?

In 2024, mostly on the ground or near it. Of the 21 on-demand charter airplane accidents that year, 16 happened during landing, takeoff or taxi, and none of those 16 was fatal. The NTSB codes each accident by a “defining event”: the largest groups were loss of control on the ground (5) and abnormal runway contact (4). Both fatal accidents were coded “unknown” in the 2024 table.

That is one year, and one year is a small sample. It shows that most charter accidents are not the kind that make the news, not which risks dominate over the long run.

Why are the numbers so different between airlines, charter and private flying?

Mainly because the rules are different. General aviation (Part 91) includes everything from student pilots in single-engine trainers to company flight departments, under the general operating rules and the pilot certification rules of Part 61. A charter operator holds an FAA air carrier certificate under Part 119 and flies under Part 135, which adds requirements an owner-pilot does not face:

Requirement	Part 135 charter	Owner-flown Part 91
Pilot in command of a jet	Airline transport pilot certificate and type rating (135.243)	Type rating for the aircraft
Recurrent testing	Knowledge test and competency check every 12 months (135.293)	Flight review every 24 months; type-specific checks depend on the aircraft
Instrument proficiency	Check every 6 months for pilots flying under instrument flight rules (135.297)	Recent-experience minimums
Line check	Every 12 months, observed by a check pilot (135.299)	None
Flight time and rest	Limits per 24 hours and minimum rest (135.267)	None for the owner flying themselves
Terrain warning system	Required on turbine airplanes with 6 or more passenger seats (135.154)	Depends on the aircraft
Safety management system	Required by May 28, 2027 (14 CFR 5.9)	Not required

Fractional ownership programs sit between the two, under Part 91 subpart K, with their own crew requirements: a pilot in command of a multi-engine turbine airplane needs an airline transport pilot certificate and a type rating (91.1053).

Part 91 also includes corporate flight departments with professional crews. The NTSB does not separate them, so the general aviation rate cannot be read as a rate for corporate jets.

What changes the risk?

The NTSB and the FAA have both pointed at the same things for charter operators:

1. A safety management system. A formal way of finding hazards, measuring them and fixing them before they cause an accident. The FAA’s 2024 rule extends this requirement (14 CFR Part 5) to every Part 135 operator, with a deadline of May 28, 2027. In the rule, the FAA said 35 Part 135 accidents with deaths or serious injuries between 2015 and 2019 “could have been mitigated” had the operators had one, and that only 45 Part 135 operators were in its voluntary program in October 2023.
2. Flight data monitoring. Routinely reviewing recorded flight data to catch unstable approaches and other deviations. It was part of the NTSB’s Most Wanted List item on Part 135 safety for 2019 to 2020. (The NTSB retired the list at the end of 2023.)
3. Training to avoid flying into terrain, together with terrain warning systems, also on that list.
4. The pilot’s authority to say no. Under 14 CFR 91.3, the pilot in command is the final authority on the flight. An operator, broker or passenger that pushes against a pilot’s decision on weather or rest adds risk.

None of these can be seen from the cabin. They can be asked about: whether the operator has an SMS in place now, whether it runs flight data monitoring, and whether its audits are current.

What can a passenger check?

The FAA’s guidance for people chartering an aircraft starts with the certificate: ask to see the operator’s air carrier certificate, and check that the aircraft you are flying on is listed on it. Our guide to Part 91 vs Part 135 explains how, with a list of questions to ask any broker or operator. ARGUS, Wyvern and IS-BAO ratings explained covers the private audits, and what none of them can promise. For the head-to-head with the airlines, see is flying private safer than commercial?

How Jake uses this

Lombardi Jet Services is a broker. It does not operate aircraft, and no broker can make a flight safer by flying it. What it can do is choose the operator, and tell you who it is. Jake arranges flights only with operators rated ARGUS Gold or Platinum, confirms the rating for the specific operator before quoting, and names the operator and the aircraft in the quote. A rating is a check on how an operator manages safety, not a promise about any one flight, and the questions above apply to us as much as to anyone.