IS IT SAFE TO TRAVEL WITH LOW COST AIRLINES IN THAILAND ? ONE TWO GO, NOK AIR, AIR ASIA, IS THERE ANY DANGER FLYING CHEAP ?

Once more, and because of One Two Go low cost airline accident in Phuket in September 2007 potential tourists and passengers of thailand airlines can wonder if it is dangerous to fly with a low cost airlines in Asia.

The 1-Two-Go low fare aircraft carrying tourists to Phuket that crashed when trying to land was an old plane as often with cheap airlines, and this is why it could be dangerous to fly with low cost carriers.

Not sure that a new plane could have avoid to crash in the same situation as the one in Phuket International airport, but it seems that the One Two Go aircraft broke easily because it was 25 years old.

Running an airline by cutting cost as One Two Go, Thai airasia, or Nok Air always brings with it accusations of cutting corners on safety, even though all international carriers are subject to the same safety checks, and the public wonders if the companies do not also save on maintenance.

But Asia is not Africa or South America, and the level of safety on the Asian continent if for sure higher than on these ones, so the situation in Thailand and Malaysia is certainly almost as good as in America or in Europe.

So why does this kind of accident as the one in Phuket can happen?

Some of the reasons have to be found in the pilot shortage that follow the airlines boom, and pilot having so start working faster than they would do before.

An the problem with Asian and Thai airlines is that they cannot compete with European and American airlines which can pay more for the best pilots, so they have to employ the youngest ones, or the ones who got less training.

No cause has been determined for the One-Two-Go crash and it could turn out pilot error was to blame, but anyway that is not a damning of the Thai aviation safety oversight nor Asian low-cost airlines, because this kind of accident regularly happens everywhere, but still less than car accidents.