A Parachute -- but No Jump Mayday!

By Christine Gorman

Some people get their brainstorms while singing in the shower. Boris Popov had his during a death-defying plunge in a crashing hang-glider. "I was about 500 ft. up over Lake Owasso," says the Minnesota businessman of the 1977 accident. A powerboat that was towing his craft over the water throttled up too fast and literally pulled Popov's gossamer wings apart. "I got all caught up in the material and was petrified. I had a lot of time to think on the way down, and I promised myself that if I survived, I would figure out a way to develop some kind of escape system like a parachute."

Popov had as much luck as pluck that day: the force of the impact knocked out all his dental fillings but caused no serious injuries. So he got the chance to pursue his scheme to develop parachutes for gliders and small planes. Popov quickly discovered that conventional chutes would not work because most accidents happen so close to the ground that the canopies do not have enough time to inflate. To get around that problem, Popov devised a parachute that could be completely deployed by a tiny rocket in a matter of seconds. Since then, the company he founded to make the product, Ballistic Recovery Systems of South St. Paul, Minnesota, has sold 10,000 parachute systems for ultralight and homemade aircraft and, he says, has saved 73 lives.

Now BRS has won the approval of the Federal Aviation Administration to market chutes for small general-aviation planes such as single-engine Cessnas. At $5,495, the product is a bit pricey, considering that the typical Cessna sells for about $15,000. Yet many fliers may not put a price limit on peace of mind. "If you fly into a mountainside at night, a parachute is not going to help," Popov admits. "But the majority of midair collisions are not fatal in the air. You're alive all the way down." Popov believes his system could prevent more than half of the 1,000 general-aviation fatalities that occur each year in the U.S. "It's that one added bit of insurance," says Mary Jones of the Experimental Aircraft Association in Oshkosh, Wisconsin.

Designing the new parachute was Popov's greatest challenge. Hang gliders weigh only 500 lbs., even if you include the pilot. A small Cessna, on the other hand, weighs more than 1,700 lbs., and a standard parachute big enough to float such a craft safely to the ground would fill up a 50-gal. drum. Not very practical. Undaunted, the BRS engineers figured out how to pack the parachute under pressure in such a way that it takes up no more space than a large briefcase and is mounted over the center of the wings. If the craft's engine conks or another plane clips the Cessna's tail off, all the pilot has to do is pull a handle in the cockpit. That ignites the rocket, which deploys the parachute. The plane drifts to earth for a safe, if still somewhat bumpy landing.

And that's only the beginning, Popov promises. Now on the BRS drawing boards are parachute systems for heavier general-aviation planes and military aircraft. As the planes get bigger, the idea becomes increasingly far-fetched, but it's hard to discount a man who falls 500 ft. and lives to profit from the experience.