[HN Gopher] NHRA's Alan Reinhart Explains Why John Force's Parac...
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       NHRA's Alan Reinhart Explains Why John Force's Parachutes Failed to
       Deploy
        
       Author : RickJWagner
       Score  : 26 points
       Date   : 2024-07-16 11:44 UTC (5 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (bangshift.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (bangshift.com)
        
       | caminante wrote:
       | What's the item of interest here?
       | 
       | I don't follow funny car (?) drag racing, but this seems like a
       | pedantic argument that a video thumbnail claiming "parachute
       | failure" is misleading because the "parachutes" didn't fail, but
       | the "parachute system" did fail.
       | 
       | And they author doesn't know why,
       | 
       |  _> we may never have an answer to [why the parachutes didn 't
       | deploy]_
       | 
       | but they want you to click and monetize a 5 minute "talk radio"
       | bit to learn more?
       | 
       | No thanks.
        
         | LanceH wrote:
         | It's a big deal to the people making and using the parachutes.
        
         | dylan604 wrote:
         | Now imagine the parachutes of Starliner or Crew Dragon not
         | deploying correctly and the investigation that would follow.
         | s/funny car/space capsule/
        
         | Swizec wrote:
         | > > we may never have an answer to [why the parachutes didn't
         | deploy] > but they want you to click and monetize a 5 minute
         | "talk radio" bit to learn more? > No thanks.
         | 
         | We got the HANS device because NASCAR drivers kept dying
         | despite their helmets technically not failing "but the helmet
         | system" did. (extreme whiplash leads to basal skull fractures
         | even in the absence of a direct hit to the helmet)
         | 
         | Resilience is all about identifying these technically correct
         | nitpicky details. If we know the parachutes were fine but the
         | system wasn't, we can go fix the system.
        
       | itronitron wrote:
       | interesting and very concise video, the parachutes did not deploy
       | because the vehicle's engine explosion negatively impacted the
       | lever that the driver uses to deploy the parachutes
        
         | toomuchtodo wrote:
         | Safety system redundancy case study.
        
         | mannykannot wrote:
         | From the transcript: _the system did trigger and the system did
         | send the signal and the air cylinder did activate but in the
         | split second while all this was going on the area between the
         | two was compromised so now the levers are so much closer than
         | when the cylinder activated... it didn 't pull far enough to
         | get the parachute wires to come out of the pack._
         | 
         | So it seems that a structural failure or deformation of the
         | vehicle rendered the release mechanism ineffective (had it
         | collided with something at this point?) This seems to imply
         | that the cable was not in a sheath, and I suppose there are
         | arguments either way as to whether sheathed or unsheathed
         | cables (or rigid rods) are the best way to go.
        
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       (page generated 2024-07-21 23:10 UTC)