I wouldn't say it's simply cost-benefit analysis. It's also scale of accidents.
A whole lot more people die from car accidents, yet there are few reports on national news on accidents. So fewer people care. Meanwhile each time there is an aviation disaster, 100s of people die and it's all over the news for weeks. Similarly with train accidents and nuclear accidents. There where only 2 very large ones but they still haunt the field to this day, while (for example) the deaths from solar installations by people falling from roofs are mostly ignored.
Large accidents have to be avoided, a lot of small ones are more acceptable.
> I wouldn't say it's simply cost-benefit analysis. It's also scale of accidents.
But that is cost/benefit analysis. When any accident can kill hundreds and do millions to billions in damage besides (to say nothing of the image damage to both the sector and the specific brand), the benefit of trying to prevent every accident is significant, so acceptable costs are commensurate.
I think it goes beyond what you'd expect just from the increased scale putting more lives at risk. Compare our regulatory system for buses and cars, two transportation options that are probably as close as possible to differing only in scale. Buses are ~65x less deadly than cars, and yet we still respond to the occasional shocking bus accident by trying to make them safer.
A whole lot more people die from car accidents, yet there are few reports on national news on accidents. So fewer people care. Meanwhile each time there is an aviation disaster, 100s of people die and it's all over the news for weeks. Similarly with train accidents and nuclear accidents. There where only 2 very large ones but they still haunt the field to this day, while (for example) the deaths from solar installations by people falling from roofs are mostly ignored.
Large accidents have to be avoided, a lot of small ones are more acceptable.