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Video of the cirrus chuting down: https://twitter.com/DenverChannel/status/1392560583950561281 https://twitter.com/DenverChannel/status/1392560583950561281 A p

Video of the cirrus chuting down: https://twitter.com/DenverChannel/status/1392560583950561281 https://twitter.com/DenverChannel/status/1392560583950561281 A photo of the airborne metroliner with fuselage blown open: https://imgur.com/gallery/yKPOWR0 https://imgur.com/gallery/yKPOWR0

londons_explore 5y ago
The plane flying missing half the fuselage suggests to me that fuselage was excessively strong (and therefore heavy and expensive). A tube is only strong when complete. Cut away half the tube and bending resistance probably goes down ~10x.
- cesarb 5y ago
  > The plane flying missing half the fuselage suggests to me that fuselage was excessively strong (and therefore heavy and expensive). It's probably the opposite: that the fuselage was only strong enough to resist the air pressure differential, and that the real structural component was the cabin floor. And that, luckily, the control cables for the tail were routed through the cabin floor, instead of through the top of the cabin.
  - stevehawk 5y ago
    It's not the cabin floor. it's what the cabin floor is attached to. Most fuselages have all of their longitudinal strength in their stringers, which are usually run along the floor. If the Cirrus had ripped through the bottom of that plane and not the top then that jet would have torn apart.
    - hyperbovine 5y ago
      Nit: SA-226 is a turboprop not a jet.
    - londons_explore 5y ago
      Stringers in a plane seem akin to stringers in a car frame... Cars have moved away to unibody designs (where the shell of the car is also the structure) because it is stronger, lighter and cheaper. Unibody designs have been the norm for almost 100 years now.
- HPsquared 5y ago
  The structure would be designed around an adequate fatigue life. I wouldn't be too surprised if fatigue considerations were such that in "normal operations", stresses could well be 10x lower than the ultimate material strength.
EricE 5y ago
Juan Browne of the blancolirio YouTube channel did his usual excellent overview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ph7OR6C90w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ph7OR6C90w
lujim 5y ago
Wow the Cirrus is looking pretty good for how much damage it did to the Metro. Flight surfaces are still there and it's only broken in half of the parachute landing. Guessing it might not have been controllable after the collision.

londons_explore 5y ago

The plane flying missing half the fuselage suggests to me that fuselage was excessively strong (and therefore heavy and expensive). A tube is only strong when complete. Cut away half the tube and bending resistance probably goes down ~10x.

cesarb 5y ago
> The plane flying missing half the fuselage suggests to me that fuselage was excessively strong (and therefore heavy and expensive). It's probably the opposite: that the fuselage was only strong enough to resist the air pressure differential, and that the real structural component was the cabin floor. And that, luckily, the control cables for the tail were routed through the cabin floor, instead of through the top of the cabin.
- stevehawk 5y ago
  It's not the cabin floor. it's what the cabin floor is attached to. Most fuselages have all of their longitudinal strength in their stringers, which are usually run along the floor. If the Cirrus had ripped through the bottom of that plane and not the top then that jet would have torn apart.
  - hyperbovine 5y ago
    Nit: SA-226 is a turboprop not a jet.
  - londons_explore 5y ago
    Stringers in a plane seem akin to stringers in a car frame... Cars have moved away to unibody designs (where the shell of the car is also the structure) because it is stronger, lighter and cheaper. Unibody designs have been the norm for almost 100 years now.
HPsquared 5y ago
The structure would be designed around an adequate fatigue life. I wouldn't be too surprised if fatigue considerations were such that in "normal operations", stresses could well be 10x lower than the ultimate material strength.

EricE 5y ago

Juan Browne of the blancolirio YouTube channel did his usual excellent overview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ph7OR6C90w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ph7OR6C90w

lujim 5y ago

Wow the Cirrus is looking pretty good for how much damage it did to the Metro. Flight surfaces are still there and it's only broken in half of the parachute landing. Guessing it might not have been controllable after the collision.