On Sun, 18 Jan 2004 22:58:15 GMT, I wrote:

In my analysis of the homebuilt accidents from 1998 through 2000, I count
about 30 cases of either structural damage or control failure on fixed-wing
homebuilts. That's out of about 606 total fixed-wing homebuilt
accidents...about 4.5% of the accidents. There was one additional accident
where the witnesses indicated the wing had failed, but the NTSB could not
verify it from the wreckage (happened at low altitude over a lake).

Of the 30 cases, 11 resulted in fatalities. One had a ballistic chute
(fouled on the structure during deployment). Three involved aerobatics.
One resulted from VFR flight into IFR conditions.

After re-reading this, I realized I should have provided more information
on use of "floatation devices." Of the 30 cases, three pilots bailed out,
and one successfully used a ballistic chute. Two of the bailout pilots
suffered minor injuries, and the third was uninjured. One of the three
(Fly Baby) was a failure of the primary structure, the other two were
control failures.

Thus, half the structural and control failure accidents were either fatal
or dire enough that the pilot opted for a recovery device.

Ron Wanttaja