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Safest airline is Australia's Qantas with a fatality free-record in the jet era (1951)

Over its 93-year history Qantas has amassed an extraordinary record of firsts in safety and operations

AirlineRatings the world's safety and product rating website has announced its top ten safest airlines for 2013 from the 448 it monitors. Top of the list is Qantas which has a fatality free record in the jet era (since 1951).

 Making up the top ten with seven stars for safety and in- flight product are in alphabetical order: Air New Zealand, All Nippon Airways, Cathay Pacific Airways, Emirates, Etihad Airways, Eva Air, Royal Jordanian, Singapore Airlines and Virgin Atlantic.

AirlineRatings.com's rating system takes into account a number of different factors related to audits from aviation's governing bodies and lead associations as well as government audits and the airline's fatality record. Of the 448 airlines surveyed 137 have the top seven-star safety ranking, but almost 50 have just three stars or less.

Over its 93-year history Qantas has amassed an extraordinary record of firsts in safety and operations. In 2008 in its successful defense, to the British Advertising Standards Association, of its claim that it is the world's most experienced airline, Qantas was able to list almost 30 notable industry leading achievements.

These included the war time operation from Perth, Australia of what was then, and still is, the world's longest air route by elapsed time from Perth to Colombo, Sir Lanka giving passengers an award dubbed “The Order of the Double Sunrise.”

This service, using Catalina Flying Boats, took about 28 hours non-stop and was performed in radio silence to avoid the Japanese. When the flights ended on July 18, 1945, the aircraft had made 271 crossings and had carried 858 passengers more than one million miles without a single accident.

According to AirlineRatings.com editor, Geoffrey Thomas, Qantas has been - and still is - a leader in the introduction of a host of technologies for the cockpit.

Qantas was the first international airline to operate around world service with its Lockheed Super Constellations in 1958 and the first to take delivery of the Boeing 707 outside the US in 1959. The Australian airline was also amongst the first to pioneer technical breakthroughs such as long range operations for twin-engine planes and the development of the Future Air Navigation System.

Qantas was a leader in using the Flight Data Recorder to monitor plane and later crew performance in 1962. Only six parameters were available unlike today’s FDRs which monitor 500 on the most advanced planes.

Qantas has also been a leader in a wide variety of recent cockpit innovations such as automatic landings using Global Navigation Satellite System as well as precision approaches around mountains in cloud. Dubbed GLS and RNP these technologies are cutting edge.

Qantas was the lead airline with real time monitoring of its engines across its fleet using Satellite Communications, which has enabled the airline to detect problems before they become a major safety issues.

And 2013 was the safest for flying since 1945, with only 269 deaths from 29 accidents. According to the Aviation Safety Network the results are well below the 10-year average of 32 accidents and 719 fatalities.