SR-22 ditching 200nm from Hilo

Dav8or said:
Can this be chalked up to poop happens, or is it pilot error?
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There aren't a lot of facts out there yet, but there's talk about an in-flight problem with a fuel valve.

One possibility is that the pilot had plenty of fuel, but just couldn't use all of it due to the hardware problem.
 
Would you be able to buy insurance for something like this?
 
No doubt this will be classed as a "save" with Cirrus people, even though like many others, this would have been survivable even without the CAPS.
 
The reason there are no pax videos is $1 a minute internet at sea . . . .the slow speed of the upload connection . . .and the average age of the Holland America crowd - which was in the mid -70's the last time I heard. Use of tech in that demographic is somewhat lower.

He ran out of fuel 235NE of Hilo - ok - he would have made the Islands with whatever he had on board if he could not access the 93 gallons in the wing tanks - and had about 3 hours of gas left. Interesting math- given the LOP 17.6gph of the SR-22 Gen V. Winds must have been much more favorable than the prog charts would indicate.

Looks like the Veendam will arrive in Maui in 90 min or so . . .
http://www.seascanner.com/schiffsposition.php?schiff=Veendam
 
mtuomi said:
No doubt this will be classed as a "save" with Cirrus people, even though like many others, this would have been survivable even without the CAPS.
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*could* have been. We don't know for sure. Would the plane have flipped at impact trapping the pilot in the cockpit? Who knows.

What I did see from the video is that the CAPS system gave the pilot plenty of time to figure out his plan once the plane hit the water. The door was completely open (good luck having it open that far in a traditional landing) and he was out of the plane almost immediately on impact.

There's no doubt in my mind that this was a CAPS save. Whether a traditional ditching could've had the same result is irrelevant.
 
flyingron said:
Not a helo, a C-130. If it had been a helo, they probably would've just picked him up themselves rather than routing him to a cruise ship for the "ditching."
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I thought I read helicopter on the video link. Either it's been updated or I misread something the first time.
 
Dav8or said:
I doubt that. He didn't pay and he cost them money. He's bunking with the crew.
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I bet he got a few women (and men, too) lining up to share their bed with him. And as someone else pointed out, good PR for the cruise line. They aren't going to put him in with the crew.
 
That is a freakishly great endorsement for CAPS. Heads' up pilot prepped for impact with door open. Hindsight is 20/20. - Without having seen this video, would you guys have pushed on away from the aircraft, or stayed on the wing like this pilot did?


**As far as ditching without CAPS. Those were pretty decent swells out there, and this is fixed gear with a Pilot that has been "on" for a long time. Does anyone know of a SR22 ditching without CAPS that did not result in a fatality? The couple of non-CAPS SR22 water events that I can think of in the last couple of years had fatalities.
 
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WBI Flyer said:
That is a freakishly great endorsement for CAPS. Heads' up pilot prepped for impact with door open. Hindsight is 20/20. - Without having seen this video, would you guys have pushed on away from the aircraft, or stayed on the wing like this pilot did?
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Having heard stories of parachutes taking jumpers underwater, I would have anticipated the same thing with the plane, and would have tried to get off it as soon as possible.
 
Turningfinal said:
*could* have been. We don't know for sure. Would the plane have flipped at impact trapping the pilot in the cockpit? Who knows.



What I did see from the video is that the CAPS system gave the pilot plenty of time to figure out his plan once the plane hit the water. The door was completely open (good luck having it open that far in a traditional landing) and he was out of the plane almost immediately on impact.



There's no doubt in my mind that this was a CAPS save. Whether a traditional ditching could've had the same result is irrelevant.
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Those were my thoughts as well.
 
JB1842 said:
I bet he got a few women (and men, too) lining up to share their bed with him. And as someone else pointed out, good PR for the cruise line. They aren't going to put him in with the crew.
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I don't get it. Why would anybody be lining up to share a bead with this guy? :dunno: Do you see him as some kind of hero?
 
JB1842 said:
I bet he got a few women (and men, too) lining up to share their bed with him. And as someone else pointed out, good PR for the cruise line. They aren't going to put him in with the crew.
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This would be much more fun for the pilot if it happened to be a Carnival or Norwegian cruise ship. Although I'm sure a boat load of old people would be just as welcome a sight given the circumstances. If it was a gay cruise, 50 men would have dove off the boat and swam to get first dibs :D
 
Dav8or said:
I don't get it. Why would anybody be lining up to share a bead with this guy? :dunno: Do you see him as some kind of hero?
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I don't think he is. But for the general public, those who don't know squat about airplanes, I think plenty would see him as a hero. I'm sure you can find more than a few on a cruise ship that would want to sleep with the guy. Ever been on a cruise? People think differently while on board.
 
DFH65 said:
Would you be able to buy insurance for something like this?
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Would you be able to buy insurance after something like this? :hairraise:
WBI Flyer said:
That is a freakishly great endorsement for CAPS. Heads' up pilot prepped for impact with door open. Hindsight is 20/20. - Without having seen this video, would you guys have pushed on away from the aircraft, or stayed on the wing like this pilot did?
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I would have tried to get away just because you have no idea what the plane's going to do, and most scenarios are bad. It looks like he got dumped over and off the raft. If he had gotten trapped in the lines or pulled under, he would have gone from safe to dead.
Pedals2Paddles said:
They probably loved it. And corporate wise, it is PR you can't buy.
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Do people make cruise-buying decisions based on who plucked the last hapless castaway out of the water? I thought that was just law-of-the-sea stuff.:dunno:
 
tiger said:
Great to have such clear video of it. Is one of the lines caught up in the empennage somewhere? The airplane starts off descending very nose low, then around 0:52 on the video it looks like something gets free and it drops into the normal flat attitude.
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The chute is launched with a rocket upward and rearward.
There are straps that go around the canopy and under the wing.
These are underneath the "shell" of the plane.

8 seconds after firing, explosive bolts cut a restraint and these lines are freed to rip through that shell. At that point the attitude changes from nose down to flat attitude.

I am not sure the reasoning behind implementing it that way but that is why it initially appears to be caught on the tail with the nose down attitude. It is intended though.
 
It certainly ended well,hope he gets a discounting he cruise price.
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
The chute is launched with a rocket upward and rearward.
There are straps that go around the canopy and under the wing.
These are underneath the "shell" of the plane.

8 seconds after firing, explosive bolts cut a restraint and these lines are freed to rip through that shell. At that point the attitude changes from nose down to flat attitude.

I am not sure the reasoning behind implementing it that way but that is why it initially appears to be caught on the tail with the nose down attitude. It is intended though.
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I wonder if the 8 second delay is because it can be deployed in any attitude including inverted. That gives the plane time for the heavy end to come down with less chance of tangling in the lines. :dunno:
 
DFH65 said:
I wonder if the 8 second delay is because it can be deployed in any attitude including inverted. That gives the plane time for the heavy end to come down with less chance of tangling in the lines. :dunno:
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Ed"Sciencebitches"Fred will be along shortly to explain.
 
Partial reason for the 8 second delay is to let the airplane decelerate to a more manageable speed. Deploying the full parachute backward and pulling the plane perpendicular to the chords would surely overstress the airframe.
A lot of theory and tests went into the BRS.

EDIT: And Bryan already posted a great link while I was typing this.
 
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Lindberg said:
Do people make cruise-buying decisions based on who plucked the last hapless castaway out of the water? I thought that was just law-of-the-sea stuff.:dunno:
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Two words that most advertising and PR is all about: Brand recognition.

People who have never heard of Holland America will have heard about it after this. Also, the people on board have an immensely more memorable cruise, with a big positive and cheerful outcome. This contributes to repeat customers. All PR you can't buy.
 
weilke said:
Some people have shopped around this nonsense that coming down under the chute on water will 'break your back' because it lacks the energy dissipation from the crumbling landing gear. So much for that OWT.
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Well you can always recline back the seat to get into a flat position and avoid back injuried when ditching into flar water? I always tought of that on my severl hubdred hourd of sr22 flying.
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
The chute is launched with a rocket upward and rearward.
There are straps that go around the canopy and under the wing.
These are underneath the "shell" of the plane.

8 seconds after firing, explosive bolts cut a restraint and these lines are freed to rip through that shell. At that point the attitude changes from nose down to flat attitude.

I am not sure the reasoning behind implementing it that way but that is why it initially appears to be caught on the tail with the nose down attitude. It is intended though.
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Per the document posted it looks like they increased the line cutter time to 10 seconds in the G5 line. They use a 65ft parachute vs 55ft on the G4 and earlier.
 
Thanks 6PC and others for answering my question. Seems like it would be suboptimal if you're low enough to impact before the lines break away.

But, I suppose, probably less suboptimal than what was going to happen without the parachute...
 
I believe you are supposed to be above 400 AGL (which is far lower than I would have imagined) and < 133 kts to pull it. I think that is supposed to be minimum amount of time for it to do its thing.

Somewhere there is an instance where a pilot pulled it ~290 AGL and walked away.
I haven't looked for it. I bet that guy was nose down when it hit.
 
What would have been really cool? If the plane had landed ON the cruise ship, and the pilot would have stepped out wearing a tuxedo and holding a martini!

But this was still OK.
 
what are the chute straps/cords made of? Can they be cut with a knife or are they cable?
 
"[...] a Cirrus Aircraft representative told Flying that the pilot was ferrying the airplane from the West Coast of the United States to Australia when the ditching occurred".

Someone down under is telling Cirrus: "Mate, I didn't order a submarine; it was an a-i-r-p-l-a-n-e I wanted!"

Glad pilot survived the ditching; now hopefully the cruise ship doesn't go Titanic ;).
 
comanchepilot said:
The reason there are no pax videos is $1 a minute internet at sea . . . .the slow speed of the upload connection . . .and the average age of the Holland America crowd - which was in the mid -70's the last time I heard. Use of tech in that demographic is somewhat lower.
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True, but: More are learning it when going on trips like this. Plus, the crew is young with all commensurate electronics, and the off-duty ones were probably all lined up with their smart phones.

Plus, of course, cruise ships have their own professional video department. Holland-America will probably issue a good-quality video for news agencies to spread, complete with a company logo on the bottom....

Ron Wanttaja
 
iWantWings said:
"[...] a Cirrus Aircraft representative told Flying that the pilot was ferrying the airplane from the West Coast of the United States to Australia when the ditching occurred".

Someone down under is telling Cirrus: "Mate, I didn't order a submarine; it was an a-i-r-p-l-a-n-e I wanted!"

Glad pilot survived the ditching; now hopefully the cruise ship doesn't go Titanic ;).
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the plane will probably show up for sale on ebay from a gentleman in Tennessee.
 
Matthew said:
What would have been really cool? If the plane had landed ON the cruise ship, and the pilot would have stepped out wearing a tuxedo and holding a martini!

But this was still OK.
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Last night I was wondering if a civilian aircraft had ever made an emergency landing on an aircraft carrier.

Anyone?
 
FastEddieB said:
Last night I was wondering if a civilian aircraft had ever made an emergency landing on an aircraft carrier.

Anyone?
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I'm not sure I would EVER want to point a small GA aircraft at low altitude at any navel vessel. The CIWS doesn't know you're a nice guy.
 
Dude who bought it waited months to get it....how's he's on the bottom of the list again!!!!
 
Pedals2Paddles said:
I'm not sure I would EVER want to point a small GA aircraft at low altitude at any navel vessel. The CIWS doesn't know you're a nice guy.
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I meant in a case like this where there were hours to find a suitable place to ditch.

But a quick search showed carrier landing lengths of 300' (seems short) or 1,000'. A Cirrus under the right conditions could possibly handle the latter.
 
FastEddieB said:
I meant in a case like this where there were hours to find a suitable place to ditch.

But a quick search showed carrier landing lengths of 300' (seems short) or 1,000'. A Cirrus under the right conditions could possibly handle the latter.
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Even if the carrier would permit a barricade landing, it is probably a really bad idea, except in the calmest of winds and seas. Just as likely as not, a GA pilot could misjudge the approach, catch the gear on the top of the barricade and go tumbling down the deck and into the drink. Better odds to ditch with the helo right next to you.
 
Other than the 5,000 passengers who will help him to memorialize the day, that is one lucky pilot.

I now want BRS. Amazing stuff.
 
Jeff Oslick said:
Even if the carrier would permit a barricade landing, it is probably a really bad idea, except in the calmest of winds and seas. Just as likely as not, a GA pilot could misjudge the approach, catch the gear on the top of the barricade and go tumbling down the deck and into the drink. Better odds to ditch with the helo right next to you.
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Turned into the wind and making 30 kts, I'd think a carrier landing would be pretty easy in most GA aircraft. You'd probably have an effective touchdown speed of less than 30 kts.
 
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