Ryanair gets a lot of complaints. Cramped seats, extra fees, a boarding process that feels more like a sprint than a queue. But there's one thing you won't find in most of those complaints: a fatal crash.
I went looking for every documented Ryanair accident and incident I could find, going back to 2008. Here's what the numbers say.
A quick note on the data first. This research covers incidents I could find publicly documented between 2008 and 2026, sourced from news archives, AFP, the Independent, NDTV, the Daily Record and Wikipedia.
Ryanair has been flying since 1985. Therefor this isn't the airline's complete accident history. It's what I could verify and source over an 18-year window. If something happened before 2008, or simply wasn't well covered by English-language press, it's not in these totals. I'd rather be upfront about that gap than pretend this is exhaustive.
Total Number of Accidents
Between 2008 and 2026 Ryanair has had 10 documented accidents . That includes cabin decompressions, near-misses, ground collisions, a bird strike, a politically motivated forced diversion and one uncontained engine failure. Spread across 18 years of flying, for one of the largest low-cost carriers in the world, that's a relatively short list.
2008 - Ryanair Flight 4102 - On 10 November 2008, Ryanair Flight 4102, a Boeing 737-800, was traveling from Germany to Italy when it suffered multiple bird strikes while landing. There were 172 people on board the Boeing 737-8AS. Of those, two crew and eight passengers suffered minor injuries. The aircraft sustained a massive amount of damage. Which led to it being written off. This accident was the only hull loss of a plane operated by Ryanair. It was the fourth hull loss of a Boeing 737-800. [Wikipedia].
Number of Fatal Crashes
Zero. Not one of the 10 incidents I found resulted in a death. Not the decompression over France in 2008. Not the near-misses over Spain. Not the engine failure in 2026 that nearly pulled a passenger out of the cabin. Everyone involved in every incident on this list walked away with their life.
Number of Non-Fatal Crashes
All 10. Every single incident in this research ended without a fatality. Some ended with minor injuries, 16 passengers on the 2008 France flight, 10 people on the 2008 bird-strike flight. But nobody died. And I think this is worth sitting with for a second. That's because it cuts against the airline's reputation. Ryanair takes a beating online for its customer service, its fees, its baggage policy, its seating. Fair criticism. Plenty of it.
But based on everything I could find in the public record, the airline hasn't had a single passenger or crew fatality in the 18 years I researched. Reputation for being cheap and unpleasant to fly? Sure. Reputation for being unsafe? The data I found doesn't support that.
2008 - Ryanair Boeing 737 - In 2008, a Ryanair aircraft, a Boeing 737 bound for Barcelona, suffered a sudden loss of cabin pressure and thus, had to make an emergency descent of 26,000 feet while flying over France. There were 168 passengers and seven crew onboard the Boeing 737, which took off from Bristol in England and was heading to Barcelona in Spain when it suffered what French police described at the time as a "brutal decompression". Of the 168 passengers, 16 suffered minor injuries. Some passengers thought they were going to die after hearing a "loud and unnerving sound" as the cabin pressure dropped.
One such passenger, Charlotte Thorthon, a 22-year-old British medical student, told AFP that she sent her mum a text: "I love you and I am going down," adding: "I called her half an hour later and she couldn't believe I was OK." [France24].
On July 22, 2026, Ryanair passengers traveling from Faro in Portugal to Exeter Airport instead found themselves in Birmingham after a "problem with the aircraft".
The Ryanair flight FR8030 was scheduled to land at 6.55pm at Exeter Airport but suddenly changed course when the pilot announced that "due to a problem with the aircraft, we needed a longer runway and we were being diverted to Birmingham," DevonLive reported. The plane touched down safely in Birmingham and all passengers were transported from there to Exeter. None of the passengers sustained any injuries.
Number of Hijackings
One incident that resembles a hijacking, though it's not a clean fit for the category. On May 23, 2021, Ryanair Flight 4978, a Boeing 737-800, was traveling to Vilnius Airport, Lithuania, from Athens International Airport, Greece, when it was diverted by the Belarusian government to Minsk National Airport. Belarus authorities, due to alleged claims of a Hamas bombing attempt, arrested two of the plane's passengers, journalist Roman Protasevich and his then girlfriend Sofia Sapega. After seven hours, Belarus authorities allowed the aircraft to depart , reaching Vilnius eight and a half hours behind schedule.
No injuries were reported.
Even so, the EU, NATO, Canada, the UK, and the US, among others, condemned the act. Russian officials, meanwhile, backed Belarus. [Wikipedia].
Near-Miss Incidents
Two confirmed near-misses, both involving two Ryanair aircraft at once. In early October 2018, two Ryanair passenger planes, both Boeing 737-800 jets, almost crashed in mid-air over Spain. The planes were reportedly 400ft apart vertically, a distance close enough to be deemed a "near miss". According to Spanish investigators, flight crews avoided the collision by diverting the planes after alarms sounded in the cockpit. One plane was flying from Santiago de Compostela, Spain, to Palma de Majorca and the other was traveling from Seville, Spain, to Toulouse, France.
The flight crews both adjusted their courses and continued to their destinations without any incidents. No one was injured. [Metro].
Then on September 11, 2019, two Ryanair passenger planes had a near miss, almost colliding at Malaga airport in what investigators had called a “serious incident”. According to Spain’s civil aviation authority, one Ryanair flight had been given permission to take off from a runway on which another Ryanair flight had been given permission to land. The distance between the two aircrafts, both Boeing 737, was reportedly, at its closest, 520 metres, 16% of the minimum recommended safety margin.
Per the official report, the Ryanair flight on approach was travelling faster than the Ryanair flight on take-off, "increasingly reducing the separation between the aircraft”. The plane landing was carrying 186 people, while the one taking off had 185 people onboard. No one suffered injuries. [Independent].
Ground Collisions and Taxiway Incidents
Three incidents involved ground contact rather than in-flight emergencies. On Wednesday 4 October, 2023, a Ryanair flight from Luxembourg collided with a truck as it touched down at London Stansted Airport. The plane reportedly collided with the truck, which was designed to transport passengers requiring mobility assistance, as it pulled up to the gate.
Video footage shared on social media captured the truck as it approached the aircraft, with the driver trying to reverse the vehicle at the last minute. However, it wasn't enough to avoid the collision with the aircraft's wing. No one had been injured in the incident.
On Jun 20, 2025, Ryanair flight FR6080, a Boeing 737, from London crashed into a runway barrier at Kalamata International Airport in Greece. The plane's wing had been damaged as a result of the incident. The aircraft reportedly collided with the barrier shortly after it safely landed at the airport. Flight FR6080 had landed safely, but its "wing tip came in contact with a fence as it was taxiing," said a spokesperson for Ryanair. Passengers disembarked normally with no injuries. [NDTV].
Then on December 22, 2025, a Ryanair aircraft collided with a fuel tank shortly before take-off at Edinburgh Airport in Scotland. Bound for Faro, Portugal, the plane came into contact with the cab of the fuel truck. Passengers disembarked from the plane with no injuries and a replacement aircraft was arranged. The incident had "no impact" on operations at the airport that day, Edinburgh Airport confirmed, adding that there were no injuries and there was no fire. [Daily Record].
Number of Boeing Aircraft Accidents
All 10 documented incidents involved Boeing 737 aircraft, spanning the 737-800 and later 737 variants. That's not surprising. Ryanair operates an all-Boeing 737 fleet. So every incident in the airline's history is, by definition, a Boeing incident. I found no Airbus-related incidents to report, since Ryanair doesn't fly Airbus aircraft.
Notable Incidents by Year
Year | Incident | outcome |
|---|---|---|
2008 | Flight decompression, Bristol–Barcelona | 16 minor injuries |
2008 | Flight 4102 bird strike, hull loss | 10 minor injuries |
2018 | Near-miss over Spain | No injuries |
2019 | Near-miss at Malaga Airport | No injuries |
2021 | Flight 4978 forced diversion to Minsk | No injuries |
2023 | Vehicle collision at Stansted | No injuries |
2025 | Flight FR6080 barrier strike, Kalamata | No injuries |
2025 | Fuel tank collision, Edinburgh | No injuries |
2026 | Flight 1879 uncontained engine failure | 1 serious injury |
2026 | Flight FR8030 diverted to Birmingham | No injuries |
The only incident with a serious injury on this list is the most recent one, Flight 1879 in July 2026, when a Boeing 737 traveling from Thessaloniki to Memmingen suffered an uncontained engine failure. Consequently, a cabin window was destroyed by debris, resulting in a rapid decompression and a 61-year-old passenger to be partially sucked out of the cabin. The passenger's wife held onto his legs. And with the help of other passengers, she saved her husband from being ejected from the cabin.
The plane made an emergency return to where it departed from, and the victim was admitted to hospital. The victim survived his injuries and subsequently recounted his ordeal in an interview with the Guardian.
It's the closest thing to a catastrophic outcome in everything I found, and even that ended without a death.
Frequently Asked Questions
Has Ryanair ever had a fatal crash?
As of the time of this article, no, Ryanair has never had a fatal crash.
How many Ryanair planes have been hijacked?
One incident resembles a hijacking: the 2021 forced diversion of Flight 4978 by the Belarusian government, though it was a state action rather than a conventional hijacking.
Is Ryanair a safe airline?
Based on the public record I researched, Ryanair has had zero fatalities across a documented 18-year span, despite frequent complaints about its customer service and fees. That said, my research only covers what I could find publicly documented since 2008, so I can't speak to the airline's full history before that or anything not covered by English-language press. But everything considered, Ryanair has a good safety record.
What was Ryanair's worst accident?
The 2026 uncontained engine failure on Flight 1879, where a passenger was partially ejected through a damaged window, appears to be the most serious incident I found. He survived.
