* * * * * Disregarding the SAUDIA Flight 163 fiasco, killing 301 people, I elected to continue with SAUDIA, as I was on the safer aircraft. So why did I sense the 707 was safer, dear reader? Whenever an aircraft manufacturer comes out with a new “radically designed” transport aircraft – whether one appreciates it or not – the flight crew ends up as “test pilots,” while the passengers become “crash-test dummies.” This can go on for a decade until they get all the bugs worked out. Lockheed L-1011 TriStar. The Lockheed L-1011 TriStar went into service eight years before, on 26th April 1972 - whereas the Boeing 707 entered service 22 years before, in October of...