Gravity is a harsh mistress... and it didn't look to me that he got the better of her.

Upvote anyway, it's a cool vid.

Gravity is a harsh mistress...

>> ^GeeSussFreeK:

The speeds and impacts needed for the successful recovery of a hardened rocket booster with no organic lifeforms
is vastly different than the parachute system needed for a passenger vehicle. The "wight" issue isn't relative to the strength factor needed for the parachute, but the size needed to slow said weight. Once you get to a certain weight, you get the snowball effect. The weight from the size of the parachute adds a significant weight value as to need a even larger parachute. Then you need more fuel to carry that parachute and still accomplish the same flight time, which in turn needs a slightly larger chute. Once you reach a certain weight of plane and want to carry a parachute, the plane becomes more of a parachute deployment vessel and less whatever it was originally designed for.
It is why they don't have such a system on the space shuttle for the "just in case", because in reality for most weights such a system it has to be the primary case consideration and not added on as a periphery.
Also, large air liners aren't designed to hang from the tail of the air craft. The tail maybe the strongest part of the plain, but I very well doubt the frame could handle the stress without major redesign. And then the nose of the aircraft would also take the full impact at ground level, which would most likely split the air craft at the wings or result in other catastrophic failure of the air craft. Also, many air line crashes result from catastrophic loss of control or destruction of major control surfaces making placement and successful deployment of such a system without causing a complete air break up an engineering nightmare. Parachutes for small planes and gliders has been around for a long time. Commercial jet liners, as they stand, are extremely safe compared to their terrestrial brothers. The feat of adding on a parachute for these giants of size of science isn't as easy as adding on a piece of cloth, I'm afraid. As a person who has a fear of flying, nothing would make me feel more at ease than such a system, but gravity is a harsh mistress.

>> ^EMPIRE:
Well, you can't forget that the space shuttle rocket boosters and tank are all recovered because they parachute down after use. I'm sure it wouldn't be that hard producing a parachute strong enough to support an airliner. (and it doesn't even have to be a single one. It could be sets of 3 for example on several key structural points). The problem with speed is if the plane is going at least at cruise speed, and suddenly deploys the parachutes, it's an extremely fast stop, and people inside would break their necks. Of course multiple stage 'chutes like Larsarus mentioned would do the trick.


Yeah, was thinking about that too. I think you'd need to anchor the majority of the chutes to where the wings connect with the fuselage. Thats where the weight of the aircraft is carried in flight, and I guess thats the best place to balance the weight between front and back. You'd then need sort of guide shoots at the tail and nose to correct its pitch. Even then, if you lose a wing like this plane did, and your not going in nose first then I think the next problem is rolling...

basically, rocket boosters aren'y too concerned about which way they fall, as long as its slowly.

The speeds and impacts needed for the successful recovery of a hardened rocket booster with no organic lifeforms
is vastly different than the parachute system needed for a passenger vehicle. The "wight" issue isn't relative to the strength factor needed for the parachute, but the size needed to slow said weight. Once you get to a certain weight, you get the snowball effect. The weight from the size of the parachute adds a significant weight value as to need a even larger parachute (also note that empty rocket boosters are much lighter than full rocket boosters). Then you need more fuel to carry that parachute and still accomplish the same flight time, which in turn needs a slightly larger chute. Once you reach a certain weight of plane and want to carry a parachute, the plane becomes more of a parachute deployment vessel and less whatever it was originally designed for.

It is why they don't have such a system on the space shuttle for the "just in case", because in reality for most weights such a system has to be the primary methodology and not added on as a periphery.

Also, large air liners aren't designed to hang from the tail of the air craft. The tail maybe the strongest part of the plane, but I very well doubt the frame could handle the stress without major redesign. And then the nose of the aircraft would also take the full impact at ground level, which would most likely split the air craft at the wings or result in other catastrophic failure of the air craft. Also, many air line crashes result from catastrophic loss of control or destruction of major control surfaces making placement and successful deployment of such a system without causing a complete air break up an engineering nightmare. Parachutes for small planes and gliders has been around for a long time. Commercial jet liners, as they stand, are extremely safe compared to their terrestrial brothers. The feat of adding on a parachute for these giants of size of science isn't as easy as adding on a piece of cloth, I'm afraid. As a person who has a fear of flying, nothing would make me feel more at ease than such a system, but gravity is a harsh mistress.

I would wager even if such a system could be made to work, cases that it could be made for would be less than 1% of crashes that occur. Getting smashes by weather, misdirected my flight control or TCAS or some other human error, or the dozens of other common flight disasters would be helped little by a functional parachute system.

>> ^EMPIRE:

Well, you can't forget that the space shuttle rocket boosters and tank are all recovered because they parachute down after use. I'm sure it wouldn't be that hard producing a parachute strong enough to support an airliner. (and it doesn't even have to be a single one. It could be sets of 3 for example on several key structural points). The problem with speed is if the plane is going at least at cruise speed, and suddenly deploys the parachutes, it's an extremely fast stop, and people inside would break their necks. Of course multiple stage 'chutes like Larsarus mentioned would do the trick.

Can I upvote again for the tag "gravity is a harsh mistress"? Please!?

"gravity is a harsh mistress"

Nice Tick reference.

"Gravity is a harsh mistress" FTW!

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

Too gut-wrenching for my vote. Something like this happened on a sled to some neighbor kids when I was growing up. Gravity is a harsh mistress.