Cirrus BRS / chute discussion, and would you REALLY pull it?

I might be wrong.

Alexis wrote:

And even over the countryside the chute is safer than the landing, it has been proven statistically by now.

ASAIK out of airport landings due to engine failure when there is no damage are not necessarily reported therefore whatever statistics there are they are not very reliable.

Alexis wrote:

Most of the engine failures over US cities would have ended fatally almost for sure.

Most and almost are key words here. The rest is marketing. I believe that a shute gives you an additional alternative, but in the specific case we are discussing I would hope to do exactly as lenthamens did – maybe fiddle a bit with red knob. A shute in best case scenario would wreck the airplane and scare my passengers to death.
@lenthamens – thanks for the great post

Cirrus is accused about its (good) marketing all the time. That’s nothing new, and i don’t want to discuss the advantages of the chute on this level. We can simply look at the statistics, and they prove that the CAPS system adds a lot of additional safety for many scenarios.

From the top of my head i recall five engine failures over cities, and there were 0 fatalities. The lowest one was 426 ft AGL at night on final approach. The chute was fully inflated the second the airplane landed (partly) on a truck. No injuries.

After having flown for 24 years i KNOW that off airport landings are doable, and i even land my SR22 on 500-600 m grass strips all the time. And i could easily put it down on 400 m. I would still use the CAPS system, because i am sure it’s the safest alternative, and that’s all that counts.

Let me relieve you from the Cirrus parachute ad nausea: Lenthamen – time to get a twin! Don’t be afraid – the water is warm.

Grabs popcorn and watches Team Cirrus vs Team we don’t need no stinkin’ chutes

Never gets old for me… :)
Does completely wreck the thread’s real value though.

achimha wrote:

PS: The Cirrus has a chute because it cannot get out of a spin!

You know something, I used to believe you actually KNEW something about aircraft. By this statement alone, in my eyes you have totally discredited yourself by spouting old wives tales.

Firstly, in the FAA world, they have a concept of ‘spin resistant’ aircraft with equivalent means of compliance, which EASA doesn’t recognise. FAR 23.221 includes the spin resistance concept, the JAR 23.221 does not so in order to approve the Cirrus, a regime of spins had to be undertaken.

More than 60 spins were carried out in different conditions – such as CoG forward, middle, aft, power on, power off, with and without flaps, entry to the left and right, banking 30° plus with the use of ailerons against the turning direction – and ALL were inherently recoverable by standard techniques – this is from the report:

the aircraft recovered within one turn in all cases examined. Recovery controls were to reduce power, neutralize ailerons, apply full rudder opposite to spin, and to apply immediate full forward (nose down) pitch control. Altitude loss from spin entry to recovery ranged from 1,200 – 1,800 feet.

Robin_253 wrote:

Alexis wrote:
I would still use the chute in every case of engine failure in which i could not easily reach a runway. Simply because it is the safest way.
That’s a very strong statement. An airplane can be landed safely off runway. Can’t say for Cirrus but my guess is that It’s not that much different.

Here’s something which really opened my eyes to the benefits of a chute.

Go flying at 3000 feet and select a field upon which you are going to conduct your emergency landing. Now descend to 1000 feet and, staying with that same field, check for any potential obstacles. Now descend as far as you care and try to ascertain if that field is really as billiard table smooth as a runway. If it isn’t, is there another field in the immediate vicinity where you could apply plan B?

Now, we know that energy is dependant on speed. Compare the following. You are heading to a field of unknown surface quality, attempting to touch down on 6" wheels with a stall speed of around 55 knots. If the pilot has chosen the incorrect field, a wheel digs in, that is a lot of energy to be dissipated.

Take the Cirrus. It descends under the chute at around 20 feet per minute or around 14 knots. Already you have 1/4 of the energy to dissipate. Further, you are sitting on seats with a 28G crush core to absorb most, if not all, of that energy. Later models have airbags. The risk of injury when descending under the chute is reduced even further.

Take it a step further. Go out and practice a forced landing from 2000 feet above a runway. Do it 30 times and imagine the runway is actually only 500m long, not the 1km or so below you – because 500m will probably be the length of the field you have to chose. How many times will you actually land and stop in the 500m you are aiming for? Let’s say you do it successfully 27 times out of 30. That means you have a 90% chance of making a safe landing. Against 100% chance when descending under the chute.

To me, the question is – when the chips are down, when I’m doing this for keeps, will I be at my best and performing as well as Lenthamen did (congratulations on successfully mastering a stressful event) or is it going to be a ‘10%’ occurrence – in which case, what will the impact at 60 knots be like? Or do I just pull the chute? No brainer really…..

achimha wrote:

Talking about discrediting yourself — I am starting to believe that there is some truth to the notion of Germans having no sense of humor…

I’m not German, I have a good sense of humour but too many people spread Old Wives’ tales about things which just aren’t true. If you meant that as a joke, why not use a smiley to indicate so? Not rocket science. I am just fed up of people saying ‘that plane only has a chute because it can’t be recovered from a spin’.

If you want humour, you should try something like this……