Unearthing Stories: How we did it

Why the Herald discovered more fatal crashes than the government

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The newspaper presented its findings to aviation consultant Bart Crotty, who spent 20 years with the FAA and the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), the aviation arm of the United Nations. For the FAA, Crotty was an airworthiness inspector before moving to headquarters in the technical training division; for the ICAO he was a safety advisor to foreign civil aviation organizations.

There are some similarities between the newspaper's findings and those reported in a 2000 study by researchers at the National Aerospace Laboratory in the Netherlands.

The Dutch researchers found that the accident rate of major cargo operators was more than three times that of passenger operators worldwide. Ad-hoc cargo operators -- typically smaller operations that fly on demand -- had an accident rate almost seven times higher.

The study said air cargo is more likely to fly at night using less-experienced pilots and older planes. ''Cargo does not complain," it said.

"While for passenger aircraft the fact that an aircraft does not look safe or feel safe can be a reason not to choose that particular airline, for cargo aircraft this is not the case. . . . The need for on-time delivery is often very high."

- RONNIE GREENE

| Reporting by Ronnie Greene | Photography by Candace Barbot | Audio Editing by Rhonda Victor Sibilia | Online Production by Stephanie Rosenblatt | (c) Miami Herald July 9, 2006 |