CAPS criteria on departure -- the presentation

What do you plan to do when bad things happen on departure?

Have a loss of engine power on take off?  Hit a bird that damages the airplane sufficiently to make it hard to control?

In a Cirrus, with the Cirrus Airframe Parachute System, pilots have a unique opportunity to use this last-resort safety option.  Except, you don't have the time to think about it during the moment.  Cirrus pilots must decide before taking off what they will do when you lose engine power on departure.

Here is the presentation slide that we now use in the Normal and Emergency Procedures section of the Cirrus Pilot Proficiency Program (CPPP).  Credit for these ideas go to seminal work by The Flight Academy and Simtrain, the folks who train a lot of Cirrus pilots and provide full-motion simulator experiences.  See these blogs CAPS ADM Defined and Here's when you use the CAPS:

Upon take-off, climb at Vy to get to CAPS altitude in the least amount of time (and not Vx to get there in the least amount of distance).  The 500' AGL and 2000' AGL are guidelines, so for each departure, determine what altimeter reading corresponds to the decision points and make call-outs to emphasize what you would do next:

• Below 500' AGL, NO CAPS
• Above 500' AGL, CAPS NOW!
• Above 2000' AGL, Consider CAPS

The demonstrated loss of altitude when CAPS was activated in level flight was 400 feet.  In a 1-1/2 spin, the demonstrated loss of altitude was 920 feet.  In a climb, perhaps you can delay a few moments and still have enough altitude for CAPS viability.  Below that viable altitude, you have few good options, so plan to land straight ahead and reduce impact energy as much as possible. Do not stall the aircraft!  That will point the nose down and increase the likelihood of a severe impact and consequent injury to people in the plane.

Above 500' AGL, CAPS is viable.  Except it takes a few moments to recognize that bad things are happening and then a few moments more to decide what to do, and a few moments more to actually reach up to the CAPS handle and activate the system -- pull the CAPS handle forward out of the holder and then use both hands to pull down.  Realize that those few moments add up quickly.  Too many and you will have lost too much altitude for CAPS to fully deploy.

Above 2000' AGL, you have both altitude and time to consider your options.  But set a hard floor that if you do not have a landing assured when you cross 1000' AGL, you will pull the CAPS handle.  Return-to-the-airport maneuvers are challenging, and often not successful, resulting in stalls with nose-first impacts or in an uncontrolled stall/spin into the ground.  For reference, CPPP prohibits practicing return to airport maneuvers below 3,000 feet AGL.  And remember that at best glide of 88 knots the aircraft descends at 900 fpm, giving you limited time to decide and act.

When pilots have gone into the simulator to practice departures with loss of engine power, even with these criteria in mind, they often fail to react quickly enough.  We mean it when we say CAPS NOW!

Think it, practice it, do it!

Cheers
Rick