Kinetic energy is proportional to the square of velocity so it's actually more like nine times the energy (ca 17 KTS under the chute vs ca 50 KTS for the ditching)
As I understand it the actual conditions were winds of 28 knots and seas of 6-8 feet: not easy to judge a ditching.
A couple more points on the dynamics of this incident:
That 28 knot wind is most probably in the same direction as the waves are moving so, if you land into the wind you are likely to impact the face of a 6 - 8 ft wave that is being blown towards you.
If you try to land parallel to the waves, you exceed the demonstrated crosswind performance of the plane (20 KTS)
In addition, there are also mostly full ferry tanks in the plane (the cause of the problem was that the fuel couldn't get from the ferry tanks to the engine) and there is a risk that they might shift forward in a horizontal impact.
J
Your maths is not correct (( to be correct you would have to assume that liquid acts in the same way as air so a 25kt pocket of air would blend with and match a 25 kt pocket of water also moving at 25 its which is not the case.
Yes I too am committed to the idea of the chute but question it as being a answer to all ills.
I think this guy was very lucky that the air craft became horizontal under the chute before impacting the water as a large portion of the decent was nose first with a high descent rate and had the aircraft not taken up its designed profile the pilot may well have regretted his decision to pull or not been in a position to regret anything ((
Pace