Years ago, engineers figured out how to make a parachute that could support a whole small plane. It's a tough problem, because even a small plane is quite heavy, and thus you need a large, bulky chute that is hard to deploy in time — so they use a solid-fuel rocket to pull the thing out.
I had heard of this before, but hadn't quite appreciated what it would mean in practice, until I saw the calmest plane crash video of all time. Watch this small plane drift gently to the ground instead of ramming into it at a hundred miles an hour. It makes small planes look a lot less risky. --Ryan Cooper
The Week
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