Cirrus fire CAPS 25 Aug 26

absurd. and they are all celebrating the pilot on copa forum
 
wellknow said:
absurd. and they are all celebrating the pilot on copa forum
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The only thing he could have done better was maybe pull lower, but that has risks too, as does trying to find a clear spot in a neighborhood to glide it in.
 
I guess we really don't know yet if the fire affected any of the controls and maybe that's why he pulled the shoot...
 
wellknow said:
how about an emergency descent.
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wellknow said:
maybe actually land
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I'm going to actually think about the circumstances that may have existed at the time the pilot decided to use the parachute instead of substituting my judgement for his.

Fire. Fed by what? Possibly engine oil, caused by a catastrophic engine failure that breached the crankcase. Ummmm...

That points toward a windscreen covered in oil, causing the pilot to choose the parachute deployment over attempting to glide to a landing spot. While I don't know the aircraft's engine configuration, it's reasonable to presume it was turbocharged, which may have been the ignition source for the fire.
 
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3393RP said:
I'm going to actually think about the circumstances that may have existed at the time the pilot decided to use the parachute instead of substituting my judgement for his.
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Well said. It’s amazing how many opinions can be generated from so few details of an incident.
 
Rick A said:
I'd want down and fast in a hurry and wouldn't consider pulling the chute if there was any water nearly large enough to ditch onto...
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The chance of burning petrol, spreading across the water, popped immediately into my mind.
 
Pugs said:
The descent under CAPS for an SR22 is 1700 fps and that's constant so quicker to on deck than a glide. It's a pretty awful situation but I suspect this was the best choice.
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Missed a decimal? 1700 fps is supersonic.
 
GaryM said:
Missed a decimal? 1700 fps is supersonic.
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Thats WITHOUT the chute :p With the chute it's 1700 FPM. I'll admit I was skeptical about the chute until I went through the Cirrus transition and did some practice emergency landings. There is no doubt for me that unless there's an appropriate runway damn near below me that I'll pull it. It doesn't glide like the standard SEP with that giant prop.
 
Pugs said:
The descent under CAPS for an SR22 is 1700 fps and that's constant so quicker to on deck than a glide. It's a pretty awful situation but I suspect this was the best choice.
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The data I saw showed just over 1,000 fpm (~17 fps). I would imagine it can go faster in an e-descent, but without knowing more about the circumstances it's unfair to 2nd-guess the decision.
 
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Another thing - I’d rather be conscious to egress immediately after landing given the fire… and not risk a nose over or whatever else a glide to landing might risk.

That’s more likely with the chute than with a landing into a field with stumps and other things.
 
Inflight fire to CAPS: If you have a reasonable field under you you might not want to pull CAPS (book says land as soon as possible not pull CAPS but a CAPS landing might be soonest possible); presuming lack of such, the 2k AGL CAPS immediate is bad advice, instead consider such the CAPS decision altitude not the CAPS activation altitude. You know in your climb it is available passing six hundred feet, so keep your dive trying to blow out the fire towards 1k AGL then reduce dive toward 800 AGL finally squatting to stop VVI at 700 AGL giving margin above 600 for a late squat executing CAPS with a zero or even slightly positive going to zoom VVI on the CAPS. Minimum AGL minimum time in the silk. But viable silk. Just watch the max deployment speed depending upon how you raced down toward 700 AGL.
 
Fffflats said:
Inflight fire to CAPS: If you have a reasonable field under you you might not want to pull CAPS (book says land as soon as possible not pull CAPS but a CAPS landing might be soonest possible); presuming lack of such, the 2k AGL CAPS immediate is bad advice, instead consider such the CAPS decision altitude not the CAPS activation altitude. You know in your climb it is available passing six hundred feet, so keep your dive trying to blow out the fire towards 1k AGL then reduce dive toward 800 AGL finally squatting to stop VVI at 700 AGL giving margin above 600 for a late squat executing CAPS with a zero or even slightly positive going to zoom VVI on the CAPS. Minimum AGL minimum time in the silk. But viable silk. Just watch the max deployment speed depending upon how you raced down toward 700 AGL.
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Should have mentioned load it up too. Spiral dive not merely dive to the extend you can. Throw on both parasitic and induced while getting it down.
 
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