Originally Posted by Pace
Other than a ground incident you are not likely to survive a plane crash! They tend to be fatal!
That's really not true, and does a disservice to the industry/pastime to say so.
As proof, see for example
this NTSB data set (Excel spreadsheet) for 2001, and look at Column G (Highest Injury) and Column O (Flight Phase).
See also
this NTSB table of Accidents, Fatalities and Rates from 1992-2011.
US General Aviation Accidents per 100,000 flying hours each year range from 6.35 to 9.01.
Corresponding fatalities per 100,000 flying hours range from 1.16 to 1.81.
More NTSB stats
here.
Edited to say that I'm sure the CAA and AAIB have similar stats, but they didn't come up in my rapid Google. Nevertheless, rates have historically been similar to the US experience.