"I don't get it: how many did Airbus build? 5771 or 6300? Can someone explain?"

They've built 5771 so far (or a little more, the number is as of June 30th), but they've sold more. Aircraft aren't produced and sold once finished, but rather an airline orders an aircraft and then it is produced. When an aircraft is popular the number of sold but not yet built aircraft can go into the thousands, as it is the case with the A320.

"Also, regarding fly-by-wire, I think the real problem is the computers controlling the aircraft. Supposedly, Boeing allows pilots to override the computers, while Airbus does not. Fly-by-wire is just the method of transferring the pilots' inputs to the control surfaces. Hence it is the computers that are supposedly causing the problems here, not the fly-by-wire system."

The Airbus "envelope protection" limits the pilot inputs to the maximum level the aircraft can take. It doesn't let you stall the aircraft for example. There is _NO_ imaginable reason to stall the aircraft, except a death wish.

The problem people have with this system is "what if the computers malfunction?".

Problem is, control inputs in a 777 are going into a computer as well, a computer that is just as likely (or rather unlikely) to malfunction as on an Airbus.

Boeing doesn't let you override the computers. Control inputs always go into the flight computer.

Patrick,

I note that you used a picture of the new Airbus 380 to illustrate this column, although it has no reported problems.

Why I would bother to comment on this is that the Yemenia Airways Airbus A310 is a model that you describe in the article as entering serivce in 1983 and that you "don't see many A310s carrying passengers anymore, though about 70 are currently hauling freight for FedEx."

It might be illustrative to know just long had Yeminia's A310 been in operation, how long they had operated it and was it new or did it come with 'careful previous owners and reasonable mileage' when they acquired it?? That would have been more useful to inform opinions.

I am aware that planes can have along flying life, and my 3rd flying experience was a trip to Uganda with Sabena on a second-hand DC-10 that they had acquired from Lufthansa (it still had Lufthansa's embosed toilet seat cover dispensers in the toilets!) As your column goes on to suggest, as an average Westerner travelling in the developing world, I didn't worry about the flying relic I was in for that trip, but I would have given pause if I was flying with some of the local airlines in that part of the world.

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Only counting crashes that result in the destruction of the aircraft (hull-loss), only counting Jets:

Airbus: 65 out of 5771 built -> 1% of all Airbus aircraft built have crashed

Douglas: 246 out of 3581 built -> 7% of all Douglas aircraft built have crashed

Boeing: 508 out of 13075 built -> 4% of all Boeing aircraft built have crashed

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Those are remarkable statistics. What is your source for this?

What about the fact that in the event of a potentially catastrophic problem Airbus planes switch over to a computer program in which the pilots no longer have control of the plane? Especially given Captain Sully's superb performance, shouldn't this be considered as a serious design flaw?

"What about the fact that in the event of a potentially catastrophic problem Airbus planes switch over to a computer program in which the pilots no longer have control of the plane? Especially given Captain Sully's superb performance, shouldn't this be considered as a serious design flaw?"

What about that? Your supposed "fact" is just plain wrong. Airbus aircraft switch to something called "Alternate Law", or in case of severe failures, "direct law". This means that when systems are failing it switches off the envelope protections and gives the full authority, even to leave the flight envelope, to the pilot. So in fact it is the exact opposite of what you proclaimed to be a "fact".

Regarding Mr. Sullenberger, who surely did a good job that day in New York, I would suggest you read the following article, written by one of the best english-speaking aviation writers out there, William Langewiesche:

http://www.vanityfair.com/style/features/2009/06/us_airways200906

Particularly "VII. The Airplane" might be of interest for you, it could help you to better understand how those seemingly mysterious Airbus aircraft work.

Those are remarkable statistics. What is your source for this?

They are widely available on the internet, for example (even though slightly outdated) on wikipedia.

By the way, by no means should anybody read into those statistics that Boeing or Douglas aircraft are somehow unsafe. First of all, a tiny minority of aircraft crashes are caused by an aircraft design fault*, and of course Boeing and Douglas first flew jets in the 1950s, while Airbus was founded in the late 60s. A lot of older planes have ended up with operators who, while not unsafe, do not live up to the safety standards of the most famous airlines of the world.

*As I was corrected earlier, the only aircraft that had accidents solely because of a design flaw were:

Douglas DC-10 see: http://tr.im/DC10crash1

Boeing 737 see: http://tr.im/737crash

Boeing 747 see: http://tr.im/747crash

The 737 crashed at least twice because of the rudder issues, the 747 in question thankfully made it back to an airport, killing only the 9 people who were blown out. The DC-10 meanwhile was a somewhat tragic case, after the cargo door issue mentioned in the link above there was another crash, which wasn't solely caused by the design flaw (American Airlines maintenance messed up big time), but resulted in all DC-10s grounded worldwide(http://tr.im/dc10crash2), as the design of the aircraft was regarded as a contributing factor.