First Emergency Use of Whole-Aircraft Parachute

Ahotasu writes "Over at SpaceFlightNow, there is a short NASA news release discussing the development of and first emergency use of a production parachute system for a general aviation aircraft. Whole-ultralight parachute systems have been available and used for some time, but this is apparently the first use in a "certified general-aviation aircraft". From the article: "In October 2002, a pilot released his single engine aircraft's parachute and landed safely in a Texas mesquite- tree grove. The pilot was uninjured, and there was minimal damage to the plane. The safe landing made aviation history, as it was the first emergency application of an airframe parachute on a certified aircraft." Here's the company's website. Looks like right now, they only have models for a select few gen. aviation aircraft, probably the most popular models."

Comments

This is one small step for aviation...

[Prince_Ali]

and one giant leap for airplane drag racing.

If we start putting these things on planes...

[Xaoswolf]

How will we get rid of unwanted politicians and pop stars???

I'm not weird, am I?

[zztzed]

Anyone else get the mental image of a 747 sticking out of the ground with a giant parachute draped over it when they read the headline?

Re:Rocket!

[ScuzzMonkey]

That's because, when fully-loaded, the Metro would, under some conditions, be unable to climb on takeoff if there was an engine failure.

Er... I would think that would be a pretty common problem among planes, fully-loaded or not...