Why don't they put a giant parachute connected to the plane?

Question

if a plane is going to crash because it's out of fuel or something why dont they just connect a few giant parachutes to the top side of the plane that deploy during crash landings leading to a soft, pillowy descend onto the planet Earth.

Answer 1

They do that very thing on some planes. I attached the web site of one manufacturer.

Answer 2

This cirrus does have them, but it would not be feasable as there  would never be a sitution something that big would need one in time for,,, it would rip to shreds

Answer 3

You wouldn't be able to get a parachute effective enough to slow the plane down due to the weight of the plane

Answer 4

I am sure that it has to be due to the fact that would have to be a giant parachute. I mean look how big the one are to slow a person down. The people's parachute doesn't even slow a person down enough. You must pull up at the landing to prevent breaking a leg or something. So, if a person is 200 pounds and a small plane is 2 tons = 4000 pounds (guess); imagine the size of that parachute. WOW!

Hope this helps - Matt

Answer 5

--Not worth it.

Answer 6

I would imagine that the weight of the parachutes would prevent the value of that.  That would take an awfully big parachute.

Nice thought though!

Answer 7

You can do this for small airplanes, but for transport airplanes- all of which weigh over 100,000 pounds- no parachute large enough could be fitted to the airplane.

Answer 8

Already done with microlites and some light aircraft but has to be bought as an extra.Have seen it demonstrated on a cessna 172,and it works.

Answer 9

If you did proper preflight planning you wouldn't run out of fuel in the first place. Most other problems can be avoided by proper planning as well.

There really isn't a need for an airframe parachute.