Airbus A300

The Airbus A300 was Europe's first widebody and the first twin-engined one anywhere. As a passenger aircraft its record is reasonable for its age: up to 7 October 2026 it has had 15 fatal events, but only 6 count, in about 9.3 million passenger flights. The other nine were cargo, training or deliberate attacks. Today you are unlikely to fly on one at all.

Where the A300 still carries passengers

The A300 first flew in 1972 and entered service in 1974. Airbus built 561 until 2007, in two broad versions: the original A300B2 and B4 with a flight engineer, and the A300-600 of the 1980s with a two-pilot glass cockpit. About 200 are still in service, almost all as freighters. FedEx, UPS and DHL's airlines are the big operators.

Passenger A300s are now a niche. Iran Air and Mahan Air still fly them, because US sanctions keep them from buying new aircraft or getting full manufacturer support. Thai Airways, Japan Airlines, China Airlines and American Airlines, once large users, retired theirs years ago.

Why cargo crashes do not count

Our score measures the risk to a passenger, so we count fatal accidents on passenger flights and divide by passenger flights. Freighters fly different hours, routes and loads, and the flight counts we use are for passenger service. Two fatal cargo crashes are therefore left out: an AeroUnion A300 at Monterrey in 2010 (5 dead) and UPS 1354, which hit terrain short of the runway at Birmingham, Alabama, on 14 August 2013 (both pilots died). An EgyptAir training flight at Luxor in 1987 is excluded too.

Six attacks are also excluded. The worst was Iran Air 655, shot down by a US Navy cruiser on 3 July 1988 with 290 dead; the others were hijackings and attacks on board between 1981 and 1999. Our methodology sets out the rules.

The six counted accidents

• 28 September 1992, PIA 268: on the complex approach to Kathmandu the crew stayed one step below the published altitudes and hit a hillside. All 167 died.
• 26 April 1994, China Airlines 140, Nagoya: the go-around mode was engaged by mistake on approach, the pilots fought the autopilot's pitch-up and the aircraft stalled. 264 of 271 died. A service bulletin that would have helped had not been fitted, and Airbus had not made it mandatory.
• 26 September 1997, Garuda 152: a confused left-right turn instruction near Medan, in smoke haze, and the A300 flew into trees. All 234 died.
• 16 February 1998, China Airlines 676, Taipei: high on approach, the crew went around and did not hold down the nose as thrust rose. It stalled; all 196 died, plus 7 on the ground.
• 20 November 2000, American Airlines, Miami: the crew landed without depressurising the cabin, and a flight attendant was killed when the door blew open. 1 of 133 died.
• 12 November 2001, American Airlines 587, New York: hard alternating rudder inputs in wake turbulence broke off the fin. All 260 died, plus 5 on the ground.

What changed

Both China Airlines crashes were go-arounds in which the A300-600 pitched up steeply as thrust and trim built up, and the crew did not counter it in time. At Nagoya the autopilot was trimming nose-up while the pilot pushed forward. Airbus changed the autopilot so that it disconnects when the pilot pushes hard on the controls. After flight 587, airlines changed how they train pilots to use the rudder at speed. The A300 is not fly-by-wireFly-by-wireA flight control system in which the pilot's inputs go to computers, which then move the control surfaces. Many such systems also stop unsafe manoeuvres.More in the glossary, unlike every later Airbus except the A310.

How to tell if you are on one

Flight trackers show A30B for the original A300B2 and B4, and A306 for the A300-600. In 2026 a passenger A300 almost always means an Iranian airline, and the airline's sanctions and maintenance situation matter more than the airframe.