In article ,
Cub Driver wrote:

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The whole-airplane
parachute company, Ballistic Recovery Systems, Inc., has now saved
179 pilot and passenger lives. The latest dramatic save happened
when New Yorker Ilan Reich deployed the BRS System last Thursday,
June 30th, while he was flying his Cirrus SR22 at 3,000 feet near
Haverstraw, NY.

"The system worked as advertised and I'm alive today because it
did," said Reich.
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Wouldn't it be fairer to say that BRS has led to the loss of a hundred
or so aircraft? Surely many or most of those aircraft could have been
flown to a safe landing.

Most of those hundred or so aircraft are ultralights, so the aircraft
was likely lost before the BRS deployment. Video of ultralight/hang
gliders with folded wings and parachute deployments show up on
RealTV and other similar shows regularly. I know the first Cirrus
deployment was repaired and flew again, so the BRS deployment does
not always cause a complete write-off of the plane.

In this case, from the limited information that has come out, it
seems like the pilot just panicked because of whatever medical
condition he had. It would be interesting to hear if the condition
was disclosed on his last medical.

John
--
John Clear - http://www.clear-prop.org/