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Airbags of the Sky: Whole-Airframe Parachutes Meet Personal Jets
The makers of the single-engine Victory hope it will become the first personal jet to use a whole-airframe parachute (right).
By Erik Sofge
Published in the September 2007 issue.
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When the alternative is a fiery crash at terminal velocity, hitting the ground at 25 ft. per second sounds almost cushy. That’s the speed at which a plane will land when dangling from a whole-airframe parachute: It’s 5 ft. per second faster than a sky diver lands, and the bone-jarring equivalent of an 11- to 13-ft. drop. According to Minnesota*-based Ballistic Recovery Systems (BRS), its chutes have been deployed successfully in real-world situations roughly 160 times since 1983—saving 203 lives.
Initially an option for small, piston-engine aircraft, whole-airframe chutes are now being developed for personal jets. “You’re going to see a lot more of these chutes,” says Alan Klapmeier, CEO of Cirrus, which recently unveiled a V-tail single-turbine jet that will come standard with a chute. “When everything else goes wrong, you have one more chance to save your life.”
Diamond Aircraft also plans to offer chutes on new jets in the next few years—but the Victory, an experimental single-turbine from Epic that requires less FAA oversight than a certified model, will likely pioneer the jet-ready chutes. The $1 million jet should be available this fall, and Epic hopes to install chutes as soon as BRS finishes them.
PLUS: Top Six New Personal Mini Jets
EXCLUSIVE: The Safest Seat on an Airplane
Airbags of the Sky: Whole-Airframe Parachutes Meet Personal Jets
By Erik Sofge
Published in the September 2007 issue.
Email
Print
del.icio.us
Reddit
Digg it<script src="http://widgets.technorati.com/t.js" type="text/javascript"></script> View blog authority
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KEYWORDS
When the alternative is a fiery crash at terminal velocity, hitting the ground at 25 ft. per second sounds almost cushy. That’s the speed at which a plane will land when dangling from a whole-airframe parachute: It’s 5 ft. per second faster than a sky diver lands, and the bone-jarring equivalent of an 11- to 13-ft. drop. According to Minnesota*-based Ballistic Recovery Systems (BRS), its chutes have been deployed successfully in real-world situations roughly 160 times since 1983—saving 203 lives.
Initially an option for small, piston-engine aircraft, whole-airframe chutes are now being developed for personal jets. “You’re going to see a lot more of these chutes,” says Alan Klapmeier, CEO of Cirrus, which recently unveiled a V-tail single-turbine jet that will come standard with a chute. “When everything else goes wrong, you have one more chance to save your life.”
Diamond Aircraft also plans to offer chutes on new jets in the next few years—but the Victory, an experimental single-turbine from Epic that requires less FAA oversight than a certified model, will likely pioneer the jet-ready chutes. The $1 million jet should be available this fall, and Epic hopes to install chutes as soon as BRS finishes them.
PLUS: Top Six New Personal Mini Jets
EXCLUSIVE: The Safest Seat on an Airplane
