On Monday, it appears the near-flawless safety record of the Airbus A330-200 may come to an end.
Since it went into commercial production in 1998, the A330-200 series Airbus that disappeared over the Atlantic on Monday has not recorded a single fatal accident.
The only fatal accident with the Airbus A330 was a different model, the slightly larger A330-300, which crashed soon after takeoff from the Toulouse airport during a test flight on June 30, 1994.
Severe weather conditions, faulty autopilot systems and pilot error led to the deaths of all seven people on board.
The smaller A330-200 model has a capacity of 293 passengers and a range of 12,500 km, enabling it to fly routes such as Paris-Singapore, Paris-Los Angeles or Dubai-London and compete with the Boeing 767.
The twin-engine wide-bodied plane has systems almost identical to the A330-300, but has a shorter fuselage length. There are 341 in use worldwide, by a variety of carriers such as Air France, Air Transat, Austrian Airlines, EgyptAir, Lufthansa, Qantas, and Swiss International Air Lines.
Air Canada has none of the A330-200s, but does fly eight 300s, while Air Transat flies three 200-series and one 300-series of the A330.
While there have been no fatal incidents involving the A330-200, there have been several serious incidents associated with the model.
An Air Transat Airbus A330-243 had a double engine failure over the Atlantic during a flight from Toronto to Lisbon in 2001.
The plane performed the world’s longest glide by a jet airliner ever recorded, gliding for more than 30 minutes before making an emergency landing in the Azores. There were no injuries.
That same year, Tamil Tiger rebels destroyed two Airbus A330-200 Sri Lankan Airlines aircraft in a suicide attack at Bandaranaike airport in Katunayake, Sri Lanka. No passengers or crew were hurt in the incident.
In October 2003, an engine on an Edelweiss Air A330-200 flight from Miami to Zurich exploded shortly after takeoff. No one was hurt, and the aircraft made an emergency landing back in Miami.
Airbus A330-300
The larger A330-300 model has also had several serious incidents. A Qantas airlines flight from Singapore to Perth on October 7, 2008, suddenly dove more than 200 metres as the autopilot system disengaged.
Passengers were slammed into the roof of the cabin and 36 people were injured, 12 seriously. The plane diverted to an airport at Learmonth, near Exmouth, Australia.
A chemical spill on a Malaysia Airlines flight from Beijing to Kuala Lumpur on March 15, 2000, resulted in insurers declaring the plane a total loss.
Highly corrosive substances being transported on the flight were labelled incorrectly as less harmful liquids, and leaked into the hold of the six-year-old plane.
While the plane landed safely, the cargo hold, wingbox and landing gear were badly corroded, and five baggage handlers at the airport in Kuala Lumpur fell ill after being exposed to the fumes.
China National Chemical Construction Corp. was ordered to pay $65 million in compensation to insurers as a result of the incident.
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