Air Arabia

Is Air Arabia safe?

Yes. Air Arabia, the low-cost group based in Sharjah in the UAE, has not had a fatal accident or lost an aircraft in flight, and it flies a single family of Airbus A320 jets. We score it 84, above flydubai, Dubai's low-cost airline, which had a fatal crash in 2016. The main dents are a frightening take-off at Sharjah in 2018 and the 2026 war, which shut its home airports.

This page covers three airlines that sell tickets under the Air Arabia name and hold separate operating certificates: Air Arabia (G9) from Sharjah, Air Arabia Abu Dhabi (3L), set up with Etihad, and Air Arabia Egypt (E5). The group also runs Air Arabia Maroc in Morocco and Fly Jinnah in Pakistan, which we do not score here.

What is in Air Arabia's accident record?

The Aviation Safety Network database has no crash, fatal event or in-flight hull lossHull lossAn accident in which an aircraft is destroyed or damaged beyond economic repair. People may or may not be hurt.More in the glossary for any of the three airlines. The only aircraft written off was an A320 leased from Armenian International Airways, destroyed when a maintenance hangar at Brussels caught fire in May 2006. Three other aircraft in the hangar were also badly damaged, and no one was on board.

That clean record is the main reason the accident score is 93. It stops short of the high 90s because the group is smaller than the big network airlines, so a long run without accidents carries a little less statistical weight.

The 2018 wrong-direction take-off at Sharjah

The most serious event in the group's history happened on 18 September 2018. Flight G9 111, an A320 bound for Salalah in Oman, was cleared to take off from an intersection on runway 30, with about 10,000 feet of runway ahead. In a rolling take-off, the first officer turned the wrong way. The aircraft accelerated down the runway in the opposite direction, with only about 3,350 feet left, and still got airborne.

The UAE's Air Accident Investigation Sector published its final report in January 2022. It found that the first officer had steered onto the wrong runway direction and that both pilots lost track of the aircraft's heading, with no outside check of the runway; air traffic control not watching the departure after clearing it was a contributing factor. Air Arabia banned all intersection take-offs the next day and suspended both pilots during the investigation.

Other incidents

• June 2022, Air Arabia Abu Dhabi: an A320 flying from Chittagong to Abu Dhabi lost its left engine at 34,000 feet after a bearing failed. The crew declared a Mayday and diverted to Ahmedabad; no one was hurt. India's investigators found the crew were slow to bring the engine to idle because they believed it was undamaged.
• January 2022, Karachi: an Air Arabia A320 had a collision-avoidance alert with a SpiceJet aircraft, investigated by Pakistan as a serious incident.

Air Arabia Maroc, which is not scored here, had a ground-proximity warning shortly after take-off from Catania during an empty positioning flight in September 2025; Italy's ANSV is investigating.

Fleet and oversight

At the end of 2025, Air Arabia flew 90 Airbus A320 and A321 aircraft across its hubs, plus short-term leased aircraft in peak seasons, according to its annual results. Nine aircraft joined in 2025, including the first five A320neos from a 120-aircraft order placed in 2019. Most of the fleet is still A320ceo, a 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 design with a strong record, but older than the neos replacing it. Flying one type keeps training and maintenance simple.

The UAE GCAA oversees Air Arabia and Air Arabia Abu Dhabi, and Egypt's civil aviation authority oversees Air Arabia Egypt. Both countries hold FAA Category 1FAA IASAThe US FAA's check of whether a country's aviation regulator meets ICAO standards. Category 1 means it does; Category 2 means it does not.More in the glossary, and no Air Arabia airline is on the EU Air Safety ListEU Air Safety ListThe European Commission's list of airlines banned or restricted from flying in EU airspace because they do not meet international safety standards.More in the glossary. The IATA member list shows Air Arabia (G9) but not the subsidiaries, so IOSAIOSAThe IATA Operational Safety Audit, an international audit of an airline's safety management and operations. Every IATA member must pass it.More in the glossary is confirmed for the parent only.

The 2026 war and the network

When Iran struck back at the Gulf states after the US and Israeli attacks of 28 February 2026, the UAE closed its airspace. Abu Dhabi reopened for selected routes on 2 March, but Sharjah and Dubai stayed closed longer, and the GCAA lifted the last war-time measures only in early May. EASA was still advising airlines in September to avoid flying over the Gulf waters except to arrive or depart. Beyond the Gulf, the network reaches many airports in South Asia, Africa and the Middle East with weaker infrastructure.

Flying Air Arabia: practical points

• Check which airline operates your flight. G9, 3L and E5 flight numbers belong to different certificates and regulators, and Maroc or Fly Jinnah may fly connecting legs.
• Check the travel updates page before you go while the Gulf situation is unsettled.
• Keep your belt fastened when seated. Turbulence is the most likely in-flight injury on any short-haul airline.

How we scored it

No fatal accident (accident record 93) and FAA Category 1FAA IASAThe US FAA's check of whether a country's aviation regulator meets ICAO standards. Category 1 means it does; Category 2 means it does not.More in the glossary regulators (86) carry the score. The 2018 Sharjah take-off and the 2022 engine failure (incidents 74), an ageing A320ceo core fleet (80) and a hub hit by the 2026 war (environment 64) bring it to 84.