You Wouldn't Expect Anything Less in America, Right?

Ballistic Recovery Systems told us that they have been named, along with Cirrus Design Corporation and Wings Aloft, Inc., in two product liability lawsuits filed in the United States District Court, Northern District of New York, related to a Cirrus Design Corporation Model SR22 aircraft accident that crashed in Parish, New York on April 24, 2002, that resulted in two fatalities.

BRS says it intends to review the claims made in the lawsuits and the facts surrounding the accident, including any reports made by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) relating to the accident and respond appropriately.

The National Transportation Safety Board determines the probable cause(s) of this accident as follows:

The pilots' failure to maintain airspeed, which resulted in an inadvertent stall/spin. The continued spin to the ground was a result of the pilots' failure to deploy the onboard parachute recovery system, for undetermined reasons.

Addendum: Cirrus Boss, Alan Klapmeier, called ANN in response to our request and offered the following statement, "We're very disappointed that society has made such lawsuits the first response to these tragedies... Cirrus will vigorously defend itself (against this suit) in court.

FMI: www.BRSparachutes.com; NTSB report; www.cirrusdesign.com