Airplanes are highly standardized. Dozens and hundreds of essentially the same model are built. A few of them are built specifically to test in various ways and even crash and burn, and make sure they behave reasonably in such situations.
Civilian nuclear reactors are mostly built by a handful, rarely by a dozen. This makes learning from past mistakes and taking preventative measures across the fleet hard.
I think France has partly solved it exactly by having a small number of standardized reactors, and a number of nuclear plants which can be run in a reasonably uniform way.
Not really. Every one coming off the line is different. They are constantly being improved. Every part on the airplane is carefully tracked, from manufacturing lot to which airplane each is installed on. Everything is designed by engineers, not custom made on the spot by a mechanic.
Yes, French nuclear powerplants were standardized and built in batches ("séries", in French).
This does not magically creates conditions for a perfect design and building process. See for example https://theecologist.org/2016/sep/29/sizewell-b-and-27-other...
Planes aren't perfectly safe (my brother was killed when SR111 crashed in 1998 after failures).
Anyone preferring not being exposed to a plane crash can abstain to travel in planes. Anyone preferring not being exposed to nuclear reactors boo-boos and hot waste has no real way to do so.
The failure points aren't always the aspects engineered by anyone related to airplane manufacture. Swiss Air 111 may have come down due to a fault/failure in wiring for its add-on entertainment system.
Civilian nuclear reactors are mostly built by a handful, rarely by a dozen. This makes learning from past mistakes and taking preventative measures across the fleet hard.
I think France has partly solved it exactly by having a small number of standardized reactors, and a number of nuclear plants which can be run in a reasonably uniform way.