Lufthansa

Is Lufthansa safe?

Yes. Lufthansa has gone more than 30 years without a fatal accident, and the aircraft it has written offHull lossAn accident in which an aircraft is destroyed or damaged beyond economic repair. People may or may not be hurt.More in the glossary since 2006 were damaged on the ground or flew cargo, with no deaths. It flies under one of the strictest oversight systems in the world. We score it 87. The points it loses come from an older fleet and a run of serious incidents, none of them deadly.

Its last fatal accident was on 14 September 1993. Flight 2904, an Airbus A320 from Frankfurt, landed in heavy rain and a tailwind at Warsaw, and the spoilers and reversers deployed late because of how the landing-gear logic worked at the time. The aircraft overran the runwayRunway excursionWhen an aircraft leaves the runway surface during take-off or landing, either off the end (an overrun) or off the side (a veer-off).More in the glossary and hit an embankment. The co-pilot and one passenger died. Airbus changed the logic afterwards.

What about Germanwings and Swiss?

Two deadly events in the Lufthansa Group did not involve Lufthansa itself, and they are often confused with it.

On 24 March 2015, the co-pilot of Germanwings 9525, an A320 from Barcelona to Düsseldorf, locked the captain out of the cockpit and flew the aircraft into the French Alps, killing all 150 people on board. The French investigators found it was deliberate. Germanwings had its own certificate, and our methodology leaves deliberate pilot acts out of accident scores, but the crash changed European rules on pilot medical checks and peer support.

On 23 December 2024, a Swiss International Air Lines Airbus A220 diverted to Graz after an engine failure filled the cabin with smoke. A 23-year-old flight attendant died in hospital a week later. Swiss is a separate airline in the group.

The cockpit that was empty for 10 minutes

The most unsettling recent Lufthansa event happened on 17 February 2024. On an A321 from Frankfurt to Seville with 199 passengers and six crew, the captain left the cockpit for the toilet and the co-pilot fainted. According to the report of Spain's investigation body CIAIAC, published in May 2025, the aircraft flew on autopilot for about 10 minutes with no one in control. The captain used the emergency door code; the co-pilot recovered just enough to open the door. The aircraft diverted to Madrid.

It ended safely, but it reopened the debate over the two-person cockpit rule, which German airlines dropped in 2017.

Two investigations in 2026

German investigators (BFU) opened two cases on Lufthansa aircraft in the summer of 2026:

• June 2026, Frankfurt: the nose landing gear of a Boeing 787 collapsed at the gate before flight LH450 to Los Angeles. Several crew and ground staff were slightly hurt.
• 17 August 2026, Munich: an Airbus A380 from San Francisco, flight LH459, touched down before the runway threshold and struck approach lights. None of the 351 people on board was hurt; the aircraft was taken out of service for inspection.

Neither report is out yet. A short landing is a serious event in risk terms, because the margins on approach are small, and it is the main reason the incidents factor is 80 and not higher.

How old is the Lufthansa fleet?

Older than most. The Lufthansa Group fleet averaged 14.4 years at the end of 2025, up from 14.0 a year earlier, according to its annual report. Lufthansa still flies Boeing 747-400s and Airbus A340s, types its competitors have mostly retired, and it brought A380s back after the pandemic. The modern part of the fleet is growing: Airbus A350s, 787-9s, 747-8s and A320neo-family jets. Lufthansa Technik, one of the largest maintenance companies in the world, looks after the fleet, so age shows up mostly as delays.

Flying Lufthansa: what to check

• See who operates your flight. LH flight numbers are also flown by Lufthansa CityLine, Lufthansa City Airlines, Air Dolomiti and Discover Airlines, plus codeshare partners. The booking page shows the operator under each flight.
• On long-haul routes, look at the aircraft type. If you prefer a newer aircraft, the A350 and 787 are the youngest; the 747-400 and A340-300 are the oldest.
• Keep a seat belt on when seated. On 1 March 2023, turbulence on flight LH469 from Austin sent seven people to hospital after a diversion to Washington Dulles (AeroInside).

How we scored it

The accident record (94) and EU oversight (93) carry the score. Fleet age (68) and the 2024 to 2026 incidents (80) keep it below Qantas (89) and Ryanair (89) and just above British Airways (86).