Students with a phobia of flying might start worrying less about traveling by air after hearing about the results of a study by the National Transportation Safety Board.

Last Wednesday, the NTSB released findings of a recent study that found more than half of passengers on commercial flights involved in serious accidents survive.

According to the study, about 56 percent of passengers survived the accidents involving fire, serious injury and substantial aircraft damage. The study also found that crashes involving impact were five times more likely to cause death than fire-related incidents.

"The study lets people know that airplane accidents are actually survivable," NTSB spokesman Keith Holloway said.

NTSB looked at 568 accidents from 1983 to 2000. The overall survival rate, according to the report, was roughly 96 percent.

Some students such as Joe Hopewell (junior-marketing) said the study helps calm their fears about traveling by plane.

"I don't really fly that much," Hopewell said. "But it makes me feel better about the FAA checking on airlines and making sure that airlines do their job right."

The NTSB study also concluded that the public's perception of airplane accidents was substantially lower than the actual rate.

Jon Woolner (junior-operational information systems management) agrees with this finding and said the study really has no effect on his thoughts of flying.

"It's technically safer to fly than driving or riding on trains," Woolner said. "The study just shows how many people survive accidents. We usually just hear about the fatal accidents."

The NTSB also said safety measures could be improved with changes such as the redesigning of safety cards and update of safety presentations. The Federal Aviation Association (FAA) is also planning a study to see how emergency evacuation procedure can improve to better protect passengers.

According to the report summary, the use of airplanes has more than doubled since 1983 and the FAA expects the number of persons to increase 1 billion by the year 2010. With the predicted increase in air travel, the study said the accident rate is likely to increase as well.

Despite the growing demands on the U.S. aviation system, the system continues to maintain high levels of safety, NTSB said in a press release.

The NTSB is currently making final revisions on the report and plans to release its full report in the next few weeks.