Here’s a look at recent aircraft tragedies, mishaps and close calls

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Multiple people were killed when a private jet crashed into a San Diego neighborhood Thursday morning, adding to the long list of aviation disasters this year.

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About 100 people had to be evacuated after the plane struck at least one home and jet fuel caught fire throughout the neighborhood.

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Many people are concerned about aviation safety after all the aircraft collisions and near-misses.

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Disasters have ranged from the midair collision that killed 67 people near Washington, D.C., in January to an airliner clipping another in February while taxiing at the Seattle airport. In March, an American Airlines plane caught fire after landing in Denver, sending 12 people to the hospital. A sightseeing helicopter broke apart and crashed into the Hudson River between New York City and New Jersey last month, killing six people.

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Federal officials have tried to reassure travelers that flying is the safest mode of transportation, and statistics support that. But the cascade of headlines about all the things that have gone wrong is drawing increasing attention.

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Here is a look at some of the recent tragedies and mishaps:

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Recent fatal crashes

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— The New York helicopter that crashed on April 10 departed a downtown heliport. The flight lasted less than 18 minutes. Radar data shows the helicopter flew north along the Manhattan skyline, then south toward the Statue of Liberty. The victims in this crash included a family from Spain who was celebrating the ninth birthday of one of their children.

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— Three people were killed and one was injured when a small plane crashed Friday morning in Boca Raton, Florida, near a major interstate highway and pushed a car onto railroad tracks.

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— Two small planes collided midair near an Arizona airport in mid-February, killing two people who were on one of the aircraft. Following the collision, one plane landed uneventfully, but the other hit the ground near a runway and caught fire. The crash happened at Marana Regional Airport near Tucson.

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— A small commuter plane crashed in western Alaska in early February, killing all 10 people on board. The crash was one of the deadliest in the state in 25 years. Radar data indicated that the plane rapidly lost elevation and speed. The U.S. Coast Guard was unaware of any distress signals from the aircraft.

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— A medical transport plane that had just taken off plummeted into a Philadelphia neighborhood in late January, killing all six people on board and one person on the ground. The National Transportation Safety Board said its cockpit voice recorder likely hadn’t been functioning for years. The crew made no distress calls to air traffic control.

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— The collision between an American Airlines passenger jet and a U.S. Army helicopter above the nation’s capital killed everyone aboard both aircraft in late January. It was the deadliest plane crash in the U.S. since Nov. 12, 2001, when a jet slammed into a New York City neighborhood just after takeoff, killing all 260 people on board and five on the ground.

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— A jetliner operated by Jeju Air skidded off a runway, slammed into a concrete fence and burst into flames in late December in South Korea after its landing gear apparently failed to deploy. All but two of the 181 people aboard were killed in one of that country’s worst aviation disasters.