1. The plan was to freefall.
2. Then to open the canopy at a certain altitude.
3. At the planned altitude the parachutists would have been at a certain velocity, but not at terminal velocity.
4. If altimeter temperature error correction hadn't been applied in such cold weather, the actual altitude would be lower than planned.
5. Hence the vertical velocity would have been higher than planned.
6. The parachutes would have taken longer to reduce the vertical velocity to the normal parachute descent rate.
7. A combination of lower level and higher vertical speed when the parachutes were deployed might therefore have proved fatal.
Did anyone else not understand that line of thought from my original post?
As an example, if it was ISA-45 and they'd planned to pull at 500 ft, their actual altitude would have been only 380 ft and depending on the height at which they'd exited, they could have fallen 120 ft further than planned, perhaps accelerating beyond the capability of the parachute to develop fully?
Last edited by BEagle; 19th Feb 2016 at 14:28.