To be fair I’ve known 2 Cirrus pilots and their passengers who have had to descend under their chutes. On both occasions it was a night IFR flight and in both occasions the pilots and passengers say they never felt a thing. In fact one pilot and his passenger reckoned they sat in the plane for.somentime before they realised they were actually on the ground.
I do not fly a Cirrus but I can see the benefit of an extra tool in the safety box, so to speak.
But with the Cirrus I would be a little more worried about the number of engine failures reported. Is this because there are more Cirruses in the air than other types? Or is there a greater emphasis on the Cirrus engine failure because we know there has been a problem, the chute has been pulled, and the lack of damage enables investigators to determine the cause more easily? Whereas an off field landing in another type of light aircraft, if successful, may never be investigated in the media and if an accident ensues it can be a long time before the cause is identified and the general media have lost interest.
You simply cannot compare the landing skills a glider pilot has with the average power pilot. Every instructor doing recurrent training / revalidation for the typical SEP pilot knows that your rate of 13 out of 13 landings without damage is not something that can be achieved by the typical power pilot.
Frankly, some of the people I have seen might be better off pulling the parachute as a precaution on every flight and they would be safer ;-)
I’ve seen videos from cirruses going down below a chute, in one it was the nose pointing straight down, in another one the wing was pointing down upon impact. In both cases landing gear and seating was useless.
Please provide sources of the videos and to the relevant accident reports.
A friend of mine had to leave a glider in mid air, he said there was no decision as such , it was just obvious it was the only thing to do.
I guess pulling the red handle on a Cirrus would be much the same.
UdoR wrote:
I’ve seen videos from cirruses going down below a chute, in one it was the nose pointing straight down, in another one the wing was pointing down upon impact. In both cases landing gear and seating was useless.
The nose down thing will happen with every single successful deployment of the system. Until the line cutters fire, then the aircraft will initially pitch nose-down, and you’ll see that in any video of a proper deployment, as I understand it.
But you say there was an accident where the parachute deployed (but then presumably malfunctioned) and the plane landed with the wing pointing down? When was this?
Malibuflyer wrote:
That is a “milkmaid calculation”*. In the vertical impact with a chute the energy is destroyed within 2cm of path while only very few (if any) forced landings hit a wall in a way that the braking process is not spread over at least multiple meters.
I think someone already said it, but the energy of the aircraft hitting the ground vertically has been designed out by the undercarriage and seats. It’s equivalent to the aircraft being dropped from a height of 4m apparently. You’ll be sore, but I don’t believe serious injury is common.
But I agree with a lot of what you say. Forced landings should be survivable in most cases, assuming day VFR conditions. However there are cases when things go wrong, pilot’s stretch the glide and stall / spin. Or perhaps hit trees or other solid obstacles. Or perhaps a smooth surface turns out to be not-so-smooth and the aircraft cartwheels and catches fire. If you don’t want to take those risks then you pull the parachute. It’s a no-brainer, as the aircraft is likely written off in any event.
Really the parachute (in a day VFR) forced landing is a mitigator against a pilot screwing up, or bad luck. We train for forced landings, and we all hope that we’ll perform when the time comes. But sadly pilots do screw up sometimes, and bad luck does happen. If you have the parachute then why not to use it to avoid this risk? The aircraft is written off anyway. As that NASA pilot famously said, “A superior pilot uses his superior judgment to avoid situations which require the use of his superior skill.” 
UdoR wrote:
Statistics don’t acknowledge a real surviving benefit of having a chute. But this won’t be accepted by a big fraction of pilots. So we have facts and alternative facts and opinions and a narrative played by the manufacturer.
I did a little light research and checked all the parachute deployments from just the past 24 months. If we assume that every forced landing in VMC was survivable (and at least one came down in a forest I believe) then we still have these 4 deployments:
- Midair collision and loss of control
- Spatial disorientation in IMC resulting unusual attitude
- Night IMC instrument problems
- IMC with iced up pitot and rapidly approaching mountain
I think most of these would have ended in fatalities had the pilot not pulled the parachute. So I don’t think it’s fair to say that there’s no real survival benefit to having the chute.
I agree with you.
We train for forced landings
Do we? How many forced, off airport landings have I done? None. Spot landings to (grass) runways yes, but the real deal landings, power cut, to some fields… nope!
What we train for is power idle, pitch for speed, pick a field, and 30ft before touching down we go around. It’s like the fire drill in a sim. Very different to popping the mask during a real flight.
As you say, a suitable field as seen from 3000ft might look very hostile from 30ft.
The „real pilots“ don’t need a chute verbiage is BS. Does the chute make a huge difference compared to flying similar planes without one, no. Does it hurt to have it, no.
assuming day VFR conditions
That is one myth, you will be surprised there are load of “survivable crashes at Night/IMC” in single engines, fatality is roughly 1/7 for VFR, 1/5 for NVFR, 1/2 for IFR these were for terrain & weather in Alaska (they don’t apply same H&S as the rest of western world), of course, you can increase your odds by choosing your mission: terrain & weather and aircraft
EASA night risk assessment
local copy
[ dead link fixed ]
Strictly speaking, you won’t need CAPS or Twins if flying few hours of Night/IFR every year but I would strongly suggest you get CAPS/Twins it if doing 300h/year of Night/IFR
Funny that all my flights in SR22 were in daylight and sunny days while most of my night or hardcore weather hours were in C172, maybe I am doing it the wrong way?
PS: there is roughly a chance of 1/100000 to die in any type of GA aircraft, it’s a sad fact but for most of people it’s a conscious choice…
On CAPS debate, I think we all saw this?
Ibra wrote:
Strictly speaking, you won’t need CAPS or Twins if flying few hours of Night/IFR every year but I would strongly suggest you get CAPS/Twins it if doing 300h/year of Night/IFR
I love statistics (not). It does not do anything to explain to a widow or kids wondering why daddy won’t come home that statistically he should be alive now. Fact is, engine failures do happen and often enough they lead to fatalities or at least people getting hurt severely. I honestly think that BRS is a total game changer if it is used the way Cirrus preaches it, as long as it does not lead to reckless flying “because we have that shute”. For IFR with low ceilings, night and over water the availability of the shute simply adds a very viable option.
But it should not be underestimated that training necessary to cope even with a full VMC engine out scenario is mostly decades old and loads of 12 hour per 2 year wonders will simply not be capable dealing with it. Their survival is more to luck than to skill.
I have to admit, if I had the financial means to fly a BRS equipped plane or a twin, it would be my choice. Just because of that.
Following some rather bad accidents involving my type of choice, I have to admit that I often think “what if” and I do not like the conclusions at all.
