Abstract
The conventional wisdom among risk communicators that air travel is much safer than car travel arises from the most widely quoted death rates per billion miles for each....0.6 for air compared to 24 for road. There are three reasons why such a comparison is appropriate (1) The airline rate is passenger fatalities per passenger mile, whereas the road rate is all fatalities per vehicle mile (2) Road travel that competes with air travel is on the rural Interstate system, not on average roads (3) Driver and vehicle characteristics, and driver behaviour, lead to car- driver risks that vary over a wide range.