Full-airplane parachutes have been around for a while, but every time I (re-)read about them, they always seem like a great idea.
The first known use of an airplane parachute was on Oct. 04, 2002, when pilot Lionel Morrison, 53, of Dallas, walked away from the Cirrus SR22 after the plane lost a wing flap and floated down near near a golf course in Lewisville, Texas.
These parachutes are from a company called Ballistic Recovery Systems (BRS). Vice President Dan Johnson said BRS, best known for the chute it developed for Cirrus, has a NASA contract to develop a system that would handle the much higher speeds and loads on aircraft like Cessna’s new Mustang or the Eclipse 500.
As part of NASA’s Highway in the Sky program, several companies are looking into the technological challenge in developing parachutes for jets.
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If more people knew about full-plane parachutes, more people might demand them on passenger planes.
Yeah, I think full-airplane parachutes would help a lot of people who are afraid to fly. Maybe plane crash fatalities could become a thing of the past, or at least be sharply reduced.