Thread: Safety tip

Hi All,

We are all in this sport together so let's all fly safe and informed.

Here is a safety tip that should be though of prior to an emergency parachute deployment. God forbid anyone will ever have to use it.
If you are in those dire straights and need your parachute try to remember to turn the engine off before pulling the handle. Of course if you are really close to the ground you may not have the time, but if you are, turn the engine off and this will reduce any chance of the prop entangling with the chute cords. We are a very lucky compared to some aircraft because our chute is on top and more to the rear during deployment. Some aircraft chutes come out from underneath or from the side.
The reason I brought this up was an aircraft (recently) was doing some radical maneuvers and got in trouble and may have been at a very bad angle. (They crashed and died.) The preliminary report is that the chute was fired, but because of the odd angle of plane and chute angle it went into a turning prop. Many many years ago I had a ballistic chute that shut the engine down when the handle was being pulled. They are out of business.

So try to remember and file it away in your head that if you have time kill the engine then pull the red handle.

But of course none of us will ever need to pull the red handle in our CT's.

P.S.
If you are not removing your chute pin during a flight, shame on you for wasting good money for an insurance policy (the chute) and putting your passenger in unnecessary risk, when in a panic, emergency and or gyrating plane you won't be able to find the pin much less pull the handle because you forgot to take the pin out on preflight. It is printed on the preflight list right on the dash. Several people have died trying to find the pin or pull the handle with the pin still in place. Don't be the next statistic.

Hi Roger,
You are 100 % right, and I would like to add a tiny thing where I am forced to remove the safety pin. I just put the safety pin directly to the ignition key, so I cannot start the engine without having removed the pin :P

Roger:

It seems to me you would also want to pull the key out and shut off the gas at the same time.

Will shutting off the ignition, but leaving the radio on, cause a transient that will damage the radio?

Henry

Originally Posted by hbertoni

Roger:

It seems to me you would also want to pull the key out and shut off the gas at the same time.

Will shutting off the ignition, but leaving the radio on, cause a transient that will damage the radio?

Henry

If you are shutting off the engine to pull the chute your radios are the least of your worries. Tom

Tom:

While you have a good point, this thread is about speculation and planning. When you are on the ground the radio (and GPS receiver) could be important in getting help. It is the receivers that are likely to be hurt by a strong electrical transient. While learning to fly in Cessna, I did shut off the engine without first shutting the radio. The radio continued to work, although my instructor got his wind up. The Rotax might cause more of a transient since you are cutting the ignition rather than cutting the fuel supply.

Henry

Originally Posted by hbertoni

Tom:

While you have a good point, this thread is about speculation and planning. When you are on the ground the radio (and GPS receiver) could be important in getting help. It is the receivers that are likely to be hurt by a strong electrical transient. While learning to fly in Cessna, I did shut off the engine without first shutting the radio. The radio continued to work, although my instructor got his wind up. The Rotax might cause more of a transient since you are cutting the ignition rather than cutting the fuel supply.

Henry

It's not how you shut down the engine that is the problem. It is not shutting off the master switch to isolate the radios from the power generation system that will damage the radios. I think most of the avionics will be OK with the engine shut down, but if you have time and want to shut off the master first that would be OK as well. It is my thinking that if you need the chute you will have little time to go through the extra steps. Tom

Thanks for that info! I also have the BRS pin on the same keyring as the ignition key so I can't forget to take it out. The CTSW manual leaves very little info as we all know about the BRS. The one I have says refer to BRS owners manual. I've read a story of a pilot who deployed his BRS shoot because of loss of surface control and then started the engine after the BRS deployed to guide himself to a spot to land clear of trees. I'm not sure where I read it but I think it was in an AOPA magazine. Also there has been some controversy on to pull or not at altitudes under 300'agl. My instructor told me don't be afraid to pull that handle at any altitude if your headed straight into the ground or have no control and I tend to agree with him. I'm not trying to open a debate on the subject but I know I have read posts from more experienced pilots than myself that they would attempt a water landing in the CT. If I was over water, that would be an automatic pull for me. I live in lakes country and people every year try to make landings in the lake and they always flip and usually get hurt. If your planes in the water its toast anyway. Might as well get your money worth out of the BRS and pull if over water!
James

First thing is don't forget your "Mayday" call.

A chute will put you in the water anywhere from 24-30 mph. The chute will make you hit the water moving down wind which will add to your speed and of course yo hope the chute doesn't drift you some where even worse than the water. If you have control and stall it into the wind your ground speed may be equal to or less than a chute landing. That's not a big enough margin to give up control over water for me. You can stall the plane real hard.

It depends on how you hit the water and if you can fly the plane you can put it where you want it. On engine out. Tighten all seat belts very snugly, fly the plane to where your best survival shot might be (i.e. right next to shore or a boat) head and back pressed firmly against the seat back and head rest, 40 flaps, full nose up stall just before water contact and you should be able to get it to at least 40 or slower. Once in the water open the door and come up under the wing. This plane will float for at least a short time due to its hollow wing and tail design.
Once you pull a chute in any instance you have basically said you give up all control of the situation and any hope of where and how you will land. If the plane will float using the chute it will float with out it. Plus if the chute settles on top of you the panicked pilot and passenger may get more tangled than they care to have and maybe no way to get out from under the chute. If a chute is ever over you in water you need to swim down first and out away from the chute before surfacing. Don't forget to brief yourself and passenger after you land in the water with the chute to do this. Won't happen when you are in a panicked state.

The chute is absolutely the right thing to do in some circumstances, but it is not a fix for everything and the chute safety pin comes out before flight.

Bottom line it is up to each pilot to make up his own mind and the above scenario is my option you may have a different one.

p.s.
swimsuit optional

That episode where he used the power was in a Cirrus in middle state NY where the pilot essentially had a blackout or seizure. When he came to, he was in an uncontrollable dive due to his incapacitation. He pulled the chute. He then was able to see what was going on and the plane's engine was still running. He was heading towards a "battery of fuel tanks at a power plant next to the river. He added power which pulled him out over the river, then he chopped the engine and fell into the drink. I would think of it much like a powered parachute type maneuver. They did a CT in the ER and found a tumor in his brain which had a good prognosis at the time it was found. Don't remember much more, but the Cirrus is upright and LEVEL when the parachute is deployed. Isn't ours pointed nose down when it's deployed?

John

There is another aspect of chute to keep in mind; it may not deploy completely.
This is not as uncommon as you might think. Watching jumpers at California City years ago, we saw it happen several times. The chute comes out of the bag, but the lines are twisted or one is crosses over the top of the chute so it never fully opens. Jumpers call this a “streamer”. All sport jumpers carry emergency chutes for exactly this reason. They cut away the main (they have release mechanisms that allow them to do this quickly) and open the reserve (or they “bounce” which unfortunately we also witnessed more than once).
I’m sure our chute with its rocket deployment system is more reliable then a sport chute, but it’s certainly not infallible. Space capsules used 3 chutes and I’d be willing to bet they were designed to be survivable with just two. We’ve only got one and we don’t have a way to jettison it if it doesn’t open completely. If it partially deploys we probably won’t have enough airspeed to fly or enough drag to drop-in at a safe descent rate.
As Roger points out, there is also the more probable risk of drifting into something like the side of a cliff that tears or collapses the chute before you reach the ground.
Because of these risks, my plan is to fly the plane as long as I have control and a reasonable chance of walking (or swimming) away. I will use the chute in the event of loss of control without the possibility of recovery (due to structural or control system failure) or with the engine out over tall trees or rocky terrain without clearings within glide.
By the way, if the water is moving fast I'll land downriver to reduce the relative velocity on contact (unless the wind is moving faster in the same direction).
Mike Koerner