Land routes also tends to have certain hazards that generally don't exist in the open sea, such as 8km+ mountains, idiots with missiles, and much busier air corridors around major cities. That might balance out the risk of an ocean crossing.

I think there is only one case, and that was because if a hijacking. The plane broke apart on landing. It was caught on video by someone on the beach.

Of course, we don't know what happened to mh17, which might have also glided into the ocean.

Just came back to look at this, and saw that parent had basically replaced his original comment with a new one. The original parent said that all over-water flights were within gliding range of an emergency airport at all times -- this is obviously not true, which was what I was pointing out.

Given modern aircraft design, flying over open water makes good sense.