Cirrus Lands Safely In Tree Beneath Chute

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Aircraft Encountered Icing

A Cirrus SR22 with three people on board landed gently in a grove of trees adjacent to a road near Childersburg, Ala., about 4 p.m. Friday after the pilot deployed the ballistic parachute. All three walked away from the airplane unhurt. The pilot, Kerwin Day, is a certified flight instructor and ATP-rated pilot with over 12,000 hours. He reported that he had control difficulties while attempting to maneuver through an area of in-cloud icing conditions, according to a news release from BRS, the maker of the chute system. The airplane was not equipped with an icing protection system. Day said that while trying to climb to a higher altitude to escape the icing, the airplane began to shake and entered into a stall; it then turned sharply and Day experienced a total loss of control. Larry Williams, CEO of BRS, said, “A scenario of this type is exactly why we at BRS go to work every day. What could have been a tragic disaster had a successful outcome, there were no fatalities in this accident, thankfully there were not even any injuries.” FAA spokeswoman Kathleen Bergen told The Associated Press the plane is owned by Trench Shoring Services, a manufacturing sales company out of Colorado. All three people on board are company employees.

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