United Airlines has suffered a recent spate of flight incidents.

They range from a tire falling off an airplane on takeoff from San Francisco International, an engine fire on a flight from Houston InterContinental to Fort Myers, an airplane sliding off the runway at Houston Intercontinental and a hydraulic system failure on a flight from San Francisco International to Mexico City. To throw even more gasoline on the fire, this weekend an external panel mysteriously disappeared off a United flight. In all incidences, there were no fatalities or injuries.

Having a single incident over a short time horizon is not that unusual. Having several seemingly unrelated events may seem worrisome. This begs the question: Is there an issue with United or with the airplane manufacturers, or did other factors cause these events?

To understand these events and uncover what it may mean for United air travelers — and perhaps all air travelers — one must look at the data.

On an average day in the United States, commercial airlines operate more than 25,000 flights, carrying around 2.5 million passengers, based on the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) screening throughput at airports.

Air travel in the United States has been remarkably safe for many years. The last reported commercial airplane crash occurred on........

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