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You don't just get to override Burt Rutan's design because you have a "perfectly valid reason to do it." For something like an aircraft you need to prove beyond

• Zak 3y ago
  It's an experimental amateur-built aircraft. The builder gets to do nearly anything they want to do (usually) even if it's a bad idea, and most of them have minor changes from the original plans. The design change was possibly an improvement when the only user was the builder who was intimately familiar with its design, but ended up being a disaster when someone else tried to use it under stress.
• cameldrv 3y ago
  You do, and this is why the FAA makes you put EXPERIMENTAL in big letters in the cockpit. If you want proof beyond a reasonable doubt that the plane is safe, get a certified aircraft. IMO the FAA strikes an excellent balance between allowing people to make crazy flying contraptions that can be dangerous, yet also keeping the civilian flying population safe. One place where there can be some unanticipated risk though is, like in this case, a homebuilt aircraft that's sold to a non-builder. In any case though, in my opinion, the primary cause of the accident was not the fuel selector, it was John Denver's lack of preflight. He took off with very little gas in the plane, and virtually none on the tank he had selected for takeoff.