(Bloomberg) — Three fatal airline crashes in a week mean 2014 isshaping up to become the worst year in almost a decade forpassenger fatalities.

The crash of a McDonnell Douglas MD-83 aircraft on the fringesof the Sahara desert yesterday follows the loss of an ATR-72turboprop in storms in Taiwan on July 23 and the downing ofMalaysian Air Flight MH17 over Ukraine last week.

The African incident involving a plane operating for Air Algerietakes the 2014 toll to 680 travelers, assuming those on the jetdied, higher than 12-month totals for the past three years,according to air-safety consultants at Ascend Worldwide. With fivemonths remaining, a further 111 deaths would make this the mostlethal year since 2005, when 916 lives were lost, though Ascend'shead of safety Paul Hayes said the direction in accident-relatedfatalities is still down.

“It's important to look at the long-term trends,” Hayes said inan interview. “What looks likes a 'good' or 'bad' year — let alonejust seven months — by itself means nothing. Fatal accidents arenow so rare that one or two more can completely change thenumbers.”

Fatalities in 2014 involving aircraft seating more than 14people have come in six incidents, compared with 162 deaths in 10incidents in 2013, he said. Only three of this year's events appearto be accidents of the kind that would ordinarily be included inAscend's safety analysis, which excludes war and terror-relatedlosses beyond airlines' control, Hayes said.

Safety Numbers

About 100,000 flights a day land without incident worldwide, theInternational Air Transport Association said in a statement. In2013, passenger trips on airlines exceeded 3 billion, according toIATA.

“It's a black week for air transport,” Air France-KLM GroupChief Executive Officer Alexandre de Juniac said today in aninterview in Paris. “I can understand that passengers can beworried, but I have to tell them that air transport is very safe,probably the safest” means of travel.

The disappearance of Malaysian Airline System Bhd. Flight MH370,in which a Boeing Co. 777 doubled back on its route from KualaLumpur to Beijing and vanished over the Indian Ocean, may haveinvolved pilot malpractice, experts have said. Some 227 passengerswere traveling on the March 8 flight.

Black Boxes

Malaysian Air Flight MH17, which crashed a week ago yesterday,killing all 283 passengers, was probably downed by a ground-to-airmissile strike in eastern Ukraine, U.S. authorities have said.Black-box flight recorders from the plane, also a 777, areundergoing analysis in the U.K., with the examination of bodiesalso under way as experts seek evidence of the rocket attack.

Another incident classified as non-accidental saw a woman killedon a Pakistan International Airlines flight after the Airbus GroupNV A310 jet with 196 passengers aboard came under fire, possiblyfrom AK-47 assault rifles, while landing in the northwestern cityof Peshawar. The incident came two weeks after a Taliban attack onPakistan's biggest airport in Karachi killed 36 people, none onaircraft.

The three other fatal events involved crashes more typical ofairline accidents over the decades, with 44 passengers killed thisweek when a TransAsia Airways Corp. ATR-72 came down as it preparedto land on Taiwan's outlying Penghu Islands.

The turboprop was on a second approach to Magong Airport when itwent down amid heavy rains from tropical storm Matmo.

Some 15 travelers died when a Nepal Airlines de Havilland CanadaDHC-6 Twin Otter turboprop plane crashed into jungle on a7,000-foot hillside in poor weather on Feb. 16.

'Difficult Weather'

In yesterday's incident, about 110 passengers, 50 of themFrench, and six crew were aboard the Air Algerie flight fromOuagadougou, Burkina Faso, to Algiers that crashed “in particularlydifficult weather,” according to French transport minister FredericCuvillier. He said there was no chance of survivors, while aground-to-air missile was ruled out.

The plane was lost over the northern Sahel region yesterday, andits wreckage was found about 50 kilometers (30 miles) inside theterritory of Mali, according to Burkinabe authorities.

The plane's flight crew asked air traffic controllers forpermission to divert to avoid a storm about 40 minutes aftertakeoff, Burkina Faso Transport Minister Jean Bertin Ouedraogo toldreporters.

“These three catastrophes involved different companies, totallydifferent origins, different environments and different aircraft,”Air France KLM's de Juniac said. “So you cannot draw a generalconclusion that air transport is less safe or should beavoided.”

–With assistance from Kari Lundgren in London, Simon Gongoin Ouagadougou, Tim Culpan in Taipei, Richard Weiss in Frankfurtand Andrea Rothman and Caroline Connan in Paris.

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