On Aug 19, 3:40*am, Oliver Arend wrote:
I'm working for a German ultralight manufacturer (whereas European
ultralights compare more to US LSA than to US ultralights), and all
our aircraft are required by law to have a BRS installed. We've had
several of our customers come down safely under a 'chute.

Of course it is preferable to never have to use a recovery system.
Events like wings folding, control systems breaking or similar are
very rare. In most cases where the BRS has to be used, it's when the
engine quits _and_ there's no place to safely make an emergency
landing, like over water, forest or swamp.

Even if you have a BRS installed, it is advisable to try an emergency
landing in a suitable field, since very likely the structure of the
airplane will suffer less damage. As someone pointed out, the airplane
comes down nose first, usually with a speed of about 5-6 m/s (15-20 ft/
s). That can break a lot of expensive stuff (prop, engine, fuselage).
In an emergency landing, done properly, you may only have to replace
the landing gear and cover up a few bruises on the fuselage.

Oliver

I was interested in seeing if there was any factual information about
damages immediately available on the use of recovery parachutes,
here's the URL from manufacturer with some interesting statistics, the
most telling of which is that those Cessna pilots listed here who
deployed their chutes .walked away from airplanes that in most cases
suffered serious damage but would fly again.


http://brsparachutes.com/cessna_182_faq.aspx


Looking a little more, here's something Cirrus specific. Notice the
number of accidents where the PIC was instrument rated.

http://www.cirruspilots.org/content/...nsLearned.aspx

One last bit. . .

http://www.cirruspilots.org/content/2009CAPSWorks.aspx

Probably 40% of my SEL PIC time is either or both night/IMC, and this
information at least suggests the probable cost and risk of deploying
a recovery chute if there's going to be a forced off field landing is
less than attempting to find a suitable place to put the bird down
safely. It's clear the chances of a no-damage landing are better if
one flies and lands the airplane, but so are the chances of post
landing fire or a non survivable crash.

The guys who really study this stuff are the insurers, be interesting
to see if liability rates and the like start showing lower rates for
those who fly airplanes with recovery chutes. I doubt there's a large
enough data base accurate statistics, but the universe of owner pilots
is an attractive one for insurers (the underlying assumption being
that group is self selecting as well above average in income).

Decisions, decisions.