You enquire about a trip to East Africa then go on about B52s! What is the question? To answer specific points at the end, have you heard of many IL18s lost in East Africa? Whilst not saying they are as safe as western airlines, they do appear to have a fairly safe operation going. Your journey by car to the airport is still more dangerous.
Interestingly, on a Moon program last night, Yuri Gagarin was shown arriving back in Moscow in an IL18, which would have been 1961. They've been going 50 years! So have I (and a bit). We can both reach full power for short bursts, leave an exhaust trail, and land back without breaking anything.