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Comment by slg | Hacker News Reader

>Number of civilian casualties is roughly comparable to those in the past few weeks in Gaza.

That comparison is interesting. What is it about planes that draws so much attention when something like this happens? It is barely news when a couple hundred civilians die on the ground in a war zone, but put the same civilians in the air and the whole world pays attention.

EDIT: Some people have mentioned that Gaza is all over the news but I would make the argument that the civilian casualties aren't what is making news. What is making news is the eruption of hostilities in the first place. For example, compare the coverage of Gaza to Iraq, Ukraine, etc. There have been several times more civilian casualties in numerous other active war zones this month, but they aren't new conflicts so news agencies aren't focusing on them.

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Two things I think:

1. Almost everyone has an intrinsic fear of flying and any accidents in the air hit that nerve.

2. Everybody knows that living in a war zone is dangerous. Conversely, you know whether you're living in a war zone or not, so most people don't see deaths in war zones as related to their everyday lives.

However, in this case, these people were on a flight between Amsterdam and Malaysia. They weren't involved in a war in any way. So that really hits a nerve. You can image yourself in their place.

A bunch of random people with different life stories together inside a tin can flying thanks to physics' magic exploding fuel at 800km/h. It's something that a lot of people can relate to as millions fly every single day not really expecting to die, specially over a war zone. That's why we pay attention. The massacre in Gaza is pretty important as well, but an entirely different story.

Define massacre, please.

Last I checked it was defined like this:

"""massacre/ˈmasəkə/

  noun

    an indiscriminate and brutal slaughter of many people.

  verb

    deliberately and brutally kill (many people).

"""

Tell me how what happens in Gaza is consistent with "indiscriminate" and "deliberately" as long as only launch sites and weapons caches are targeted and warnings are sent out well in advance, something I haven't heard any other army has ever done so consistently before. (And I will happily tell you that I don't think the Israelis are without fault. I just want this sick twisting of referential frames to stay away from hn.)

> It is barely news when a couple hundred civilians die on the ground in a war zone

Have you been watching the news recently? Wall-to-wall coverage of Gaza.

Which news, specifically. US news tends to be sickeningly myopic.

Turn on any American news outlet, check the front page of any American newspaper, and you'll see tons of coverage of Gaza. It's all over the place. Wall to wall.

If you aren't seeing it then you either aren't really paying attention, or you don't consume American media and have no idea what you're talking about on this topic.

Well, it's going to be overshadowed by this plane crash for a bit.

You think the recent Gaza conflict has been "barely news?" Are you kidding?

People are afraid of flying because they aren't in control. When you or someone you can see is behind the wheel, you have more control, which makes you feel safer (even though having that control makes things more dangerous).

That's why the world is so terrified of trains.

I'm not sure whether you were joking or not - train crashes get massively disproportionate coverage compared to car crashes

Sure, but he wasn't talking about coverage but about fear of flying. Very few people are afraid of riding a train in the same sense that many are afraid of flying in a plane. It's an interesting point.

Train crashes are still a big deal, but if you're in a train crash and survive then rescue vehicles/personnel will show up. If your plane breaks up or whatever and you survive, you're almost certainly going to die when you hit the ground. Gravity and velocity are much bigger factors than for trains, in general.

The Asiana plane crash at SFO last year where only 2 or 3 people died as the plane crashed and broke up upon landing is very, very unusual.

Very, very very unusual. I thought it was a relatively low energy crash before viewing amateur video that made it clear that near the end the nose was on the ground and the rest of the plane pivoted around it 270 degrees or more (!). The crash bled off energy in a slow, survivable way.

Couple reasons of the top of my head: War is common. Plane crashes are rare. The average CNN viewer doesn't live anywhere near a warzone, but they probably have and are going to ride a commercial flight.

Because the passengers on that plane were not shelling a country that they vow to destroy even if it kills all their children.

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