The recovery of the two cockpit recorders of the crashed plane in Baotou, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region will hopefully help decode the cause of the accident, but it is not necessarily going to dispel the growing "flying panic" of the public.

On Sunday, the 50-seat branch-line jet CRJ-200, with 47 passengers and six crew members on board, dived into a lake in Nanhai Park in Baotou shortly after it took off. All on board and two on the ground were killed.

It has been reported that in the wake of the Baotou accident, travellers have backed off from taking planes, especially small ones. As a result, air fares are on the decline on some routes.

Human error has been ruled out as the cause of the crash, said one member of the investigation team, according to the Xinhua News Agency.

Li Fenghua, general manager of China Eastern Airlines, which operates the plane, also said the widely rumoured possible causes, such as irregular early take-off, careless safety checks and operational error by a tired crew, were not well founded.

But the public still doubts the airline's managerial and operational soundness.

The Beijing Times reported that three passengers on the plane used the identity cards of others to get on board. Li Fenghua said this could not have caused the accident. He may be right, but the loophole does pose great potential hazards for safety.

A series of accidents - although not fatal - have occurred recently, which reinforces the public's fear.

On Monday, a Bombardier CRJ-200 plane experienced landing gear problems in Northeast China's Jilin Province, just a day after the crash of the same type of aircraft in Baotou. The plane had to circle in the air for more than an hour to dump fuel before safely returning to the take-off airport.

On Tuesday, an Air China plane slid off the runway onto nearby grassland after landing at the Kunming airport in Southwest China's Yunnan Province.

It is understandable that many are wondering why these accidents are happening and whether they are purely accidental. Something is wrong.

Are those accidents caused by operational or mechanical malfunctions? Is there any defect in the planes themselves? The public will not feel reassured before questions like these are answered.Enditem