Life is a sexually transmitted, and ultimately fatal, disease.

The probability that you will die in any given year during your life is one in 77.

Would you surrender one week a year every year of your life to live one year longer? Remember you would be paying in young, fit and innocent years and redeeming in old, crusty and feeble years.

"Safety" is a little like insurance in that we all pay a little to reduce the number of catastrophic losses to be born by the few. Payment is due in the form of treasure or, and of greater value, time. After all, everyone is comes into this world with an average time account balance of 450,000 waking hours.  These accounts are drained at a universally fixed rate but, to a large extent and especially true for the members here, how that time is spent is at the discretion of the owner. Unfortunately, as a society we are not very rational in the management of these accounts. All too often we surrender a portion of our lives to placate a fear of the possible, or even the impossible. Others demand a premium to soothe their fears. None of this is rational as safety is not commonly quantified as a metric. It is only communicated in relativistic terms such as "more safe", less safe" and "un-safe".  What the heck does "un-safe" mean? Does it simply mean dangerous or does it imply that the are no safe elements to be found?

In engineering we refer to safety as the difference between how something is used and when something will fail. But this "margin of safety" isn't really safety at all, it is a tolerance to unexpected overload. Safety can also be quantified statistically but those statistics apply to a large population and are meaningless to the individual. To the individual there are only two possible outcomes 0% and 100%. There is no "a little pregnant".

Ultimately, safety, like happiness or health, is a process and not a thing. It cannot be measured in meaningful quantitative terms on an individual basis. Levels of safety cannot be assigned to inanimate objects as the are, ultimately, inanimate. If you gave whisky and car keys to a 17 year old boy who proceeded to have a fatal accident would it be the whisky, the keys or his age that killed him? Were the keys unsafe because they allowed the car to be operated by an intoxicated driver? Was the whisky unsafe because of its intoxicating effects? Was the car unsafe because it could not protect the driver in a 100 mph collision with a bridge abutment? Or was it how the combination was used that was unsafe?

Is a 1/4-28 dash 8 AN bolt unsafe? That depends on how it is used. If it is used as part of a vacuum pump attachment then is will likely do just fine and be considered safe. If it is the only bolt holding on the propeller then it will likely fail and be considered unsafe. Has the bolt morphed in some way? Again it comes down to the process of use and not an intrinsic quality.

The general misconception about safety being an intrinsic quality stems from vernacular discussions of the difference between a components operating point and its failure point. If a component is designed such that it can survive all possible operational conditions it may be referred to a safe or intrinsically safe.  For example, suppose an airplane had a small enough engine, enough drag and a strong enough airframe such that it had no maneuvering speed VA. You could vertically dive the airplane at full power then move the controls to the stops without a structural failure. Is it possible to design and build such an airplane? Sure, but what a dog.

Into the fray step individuals such as Ayers and Garrison who make generalized comments about safety that manifest as misguided wishes about aircraft design and the anthropomorphization of hardware. Comments such as :

<< Safety, in airplanes with nonstandard characteristics, resides in the partnership of the airplane and its practiced pilot.>>

are useless, if not dangerous. There is no partnership. There is only the pilot and the pilot is solely responsible for safety regardless of "characteristics". This is especially true in experimental  aircraft where the pilot is often the builder and the mechanic. Likewise Ayers' assertion that pilots complacency and nonchalance can be overcome by aircraft with larger margins (lower walls to walk) is a priori absurd. Would not the behavior continue until the new margin is consumed? If someone is in the habit of picking up a gun, pointing it in a random direction and pulling the trigger the answer is not fewer bullets in the clip. The answer is better gun safety instruction.

Intentional or not, Ayers is exhibiting the marketing habits of a confidence man. Step one, earn the mark's trust through concern for the marks safety. Step two, establish the high ground with obscure terminology and act surprised when the mark does not understand. Step three,  distract the mark from the truth "safety lies in design". Step four, offer the snake oil "My design (on paper) is safer (that your flying aircraft)".

You don't agree? Fine, here is the test. Can Ayers' arguments be applied to ANY aircraft? Yes they can, therefore ANY aircraft could be safer and the only "safe" aircraft is no aircraft at all.

What is the safest class of aircraft? Commercial. Are Commercial aircraft easier to fly than a 172? Lower stall speeds? Wider safety margins? No, no and no. They are operationally safer because of better training in spite of the increased complexity and lower operating margins.

What about the paradox of the ballistic aircraft parachute? Does it save lives by destroying the aircraft and likely injuring the passengers or does it give pilots false confidence to fly into situations that require equipment and skills not at hand, precipitating their need? We don't have enough data to know, but that doesn't stop the marketing claims.

The question of how the IV could be made safer by design was asked many years ago. The answer is the Columbia,  and aircraft design that meets the required performance margins for certified aircraft and not some random "I pulled this out of my butt" incremental shuffling of performance tradeoffs. 

The question of how experimental Lancairs can be made safer, without redesigning them,  has also been asked. The answer is training.

To say that the answer is a different airplane is non sequitur and , by Ayers' own arguments, the assignment of safety responsibility to the designer will exacerbate the nonchalance factor and is therefore, ultimately, unsafe.

If Mr. Ayers feels he can build a superior aircraft then he is welcome to do so and to then offer extraordinary proof his extraordinary claims demand. His assertion that the best cure for a lame horse is to shoot the horse and buy his horse demonstrates an acute lack of appreciation for the realities of the situation. His horse, by the way, has only three legs so it is 25% less likely to go lame. Kind of a funny gait, though.

TANSTAAFL

BTW, I can think of half a dozen applications of the word "derivative" and none of them have to do with aircraft performance. I would invite Mr. Ayers to explain this "common" aeronautical term and correct a glaring omission in the education of so many.

Regards
Brent Regan