<sigh> I said I would never get in a disagreement with you again. Because:
1. You will take more time to prepare, and
2. You're smarter than me.

But... complicated that TRAINED PILOTS don't do it properly sometimes, generally means they didn't do it often enough, and/or soon enough. An untrained passenger with an incapacitated pilot is not likely to make the same mistake, providing they have been given that instruction.

And is it really that difficult to determine when a pilot is incapacitated? I don't think so.

If you have an incapacitated pilot, the "when" is not complex. Do it now. The how is not complex. Pull the knobs back (black and red - they're right there together) and pull the red chute handle.

They would NOT make the same mistake as many pilots have. Those have been made because they thought they could save the plane. A passenger just wants on the ground. They don't have all the thought processes to go through.

At least, those are the thoughts that make sense to me. As you've said (a thousand times), it hasn't happened, so opinions are all we have.

No, in addition to the times they didn't pull and should, there are clearly times when the pilots pulled the chute and didn't need to, so the error is made both ways in my view.

The difference is that if you pull and don't need to, it is a great PR event for the chute and you are counted among the blessed "saved".


Ah, the presumption that incapacitation is binary, on or off. If only it were that simple.

Incapacitation comes in all forms and in varying degrees. It is simply not that easy to determine exactly when a pilot is no longer able to perform. Even copilots, who know what proper performance looks like, fail to do that properly many times.

The vast majority of heart attacks, strokes, and sudden mental disorders do not cause loss of consciousness.

A human is not a light bulb that burns out instantly.

I submit that the "pilot incapacitation" event is far more subtle and complex than people generally think it is.

Mike C.

I have had incapacitated pilots in the sim and have played the incapacitated pilot in the sim.

It's take a while to figure it out and accept it. Made even worse by a good actor!

No comment on the cirrus

No, in addition to the times they didn't pull and should, there are clearly times when the pilots pulled the chute and didn't need to, so the error is made both ways in my view.

Sure it could.

Pilot dozes off while on autopilot, passenger freaks out, pulls chute.

There are false negatives (should have pulled but didn't) and false positives (pulled but didn't need to). Pilots and passengers won't be perfect either way.

Mike C.

And this is why I don't argue. It's not sensible to think a passenger would freak out with a pilot asleep WHILE ON AUTOPILOT - plane straight and level; XM jazz music playing along - and their reaction is PULL THE CHUTE.

I'm just guessing, but I see the passenger tapping the pilot on the arm, or maybe in the freak-out scenario, whopping him and yelling, "Hey! Are you asleep or DEAD?"

I'm done. I'm convinced you have secret chute-envy, so you continue your mission. Carry on.

Passenger fears about pilot incapacitation occur across all airplane brands. That's why people invented those "pinch-hitter" courses. I think the BPPP folks still offer that.

It's a legitimate concern for passengers and therefore for the rest of us. Instructing a passenger in parachute use is one way of dealing with that fear, even though it is exceedingly unlikely that it will ever be needed.

And, that's OK.

The great thing about Cirrus is that it encourages training talk.

To follow Mike's line of reasoning, we should be (and I believe we are) having almost exact scenarios for the pilot as to when to pull the chute. The same should most probably be spelled out for the passenger, ie, they get a briefing card that says: if pilot looks dead/asleep, try wake him up, if not able to wake him then do 'x'. That 'x' may be to pull the chute, or there may be other steps prior.

The chute pull is NO DIFFERENT than training to perform SEI ops in a twin. Both require training, but require discipline.

If this discipline is followed then the chute is a very, very good safety enhancement to the airframe, just as a second engine is. It is up to training and pilot for both safety devices to perform as they should.

As to the OP post, the Cirrus in my humble opinion is the best GA airplane on the market with 4 seats.

Deleted

Mike,

What's the incidence of pilot incapacitation contributing to an accident? I'm thinking it's vanishingly small.

A friend of mine was fishing with a friend the other day when he suddenly his eyes rolled back and he passed out. He was unresponsive for over 10 minutes and very groggy until they got him to the emergency room. Come to find out he had an internal infection that came on suddenly. Had he been the pilot in a plane the plane would have crashed and everyone most likely died. The chute is another tool in the chest. Arguing against it's usefulness is ridiculous. If you follow the training guidelines that Cirrus has you will never pull it when you shouldn't and will always pull it when you should.

Amen. It really baffles me how people can argue against having the option.

I am test flying one on Friday and the reason I'm doing it is that I don't fly with other pilots and if I become incapacitated, there needs to be a reasonable way for them (and perhaps me) to survive. Love the Bonanza and have flown them for almost 20 years, but I don't have a good answer for the question of what happens if "something happens to me", and I owe my passengers a decent answer to that question.

I don't have a dog in this race, but I believe that if someone announced a parachute for the Bonanza's at a very attractive price the devotes would be in line to purchase one.

It is a very powerful thing, as every new plane made (new design) built or that has announced it is going to be built has included a chute in the design.

My instuctor has a student that trains in the SR20 solely b/c his wife said so! As mentioned prior it has a chute therefore he stands somewhat (can't mitigate the risk) better chance of survival than without it.

Me.. I just could not afford the extra $100/hr lesson in it.

Now that I am about done with the lessons, Check ride one week from today, I am looking at the future use and mission being served. They are not an economical short trip time machine but they are comparable long distance time machine.

Will ask how much more $$$ I have to part with in order to get checked out in the 20 after reading all these comments.

I did a Google search on "pilot incapacitation statistics". There are a couple of studies showing the risk of an accident from incapacitation is in the 2-3 per thousand pilots range. The risk increases with age, as might be expected. I haven't decided how meaningful, or not, those nbers are. Clearly the risk is not zero, but it still seems small to me.

The perception of risk from incapacitation is, however, much greater than what the stats show. That is something that will never change, and will continue to motivate sales of planes with chutes, all logic aside.

Exactly, we're focusing on something literally less than 1 in 10 million event.

The chute incapacitation argument is about psychological comfort, not reality.

Most of the fatal incapacitation events I know about are CO poisoning in piston airplanes. In that case, passenger incapacitation happens as well.

In others, passengers have done a pretty good job of getting planes down even when it does happen. Example:

http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=96248
http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/09/world/eur ... nds-plane/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/04/0 ... 99323.html
http://www.golfhotelwhiskey.com/passeng ... ilot-dies/

Pinch hitters courses help, but even without it, an incapacitated pilot is very often not fatal.

Does anybody know of a case of pilot incapacitation, with a passenger, where the incapacitation affected only the pilot and the occupants died? I don't know of one, but I would guess it has happened.

Mike C.