Driving is orders of magnitude more likely to kill you at any second you’re in a car, than flying is at any second you’re in a plane.

This is an oft-repeated factoid that comes straight from the airlines bending statistics to meet their desires. It’s true that on a per mile basis, planes are safer. But on a per trip basis, cars actually win on safety.

And this makes some sense once you think about it. A car ride is typically going to be a frequent, short distance. Whereas air trips are infrequent and cover huge distances. So the accident-per-trip stat is watered down with cars having lots of trips, while the accident-per-mile stat is watered down with planes covering a lot of miles per trip.

And airlines conveniently only ever quote the accident-per-mile number when comparing safety statistics, because they have a vested interest in making airplanes seem statistically safer. If anything, seeing this factoid repeated is just a reminder that even math can be intentionally biased to fit a certain agenda.