"Loss of door in flight is Bad Bad Bad"
Just to throw a few facts into the mix:
There are a number of cases now, including the Florida factory
demonstrator.
It is embarrassing, It is expensive, It creates a lot of air noise.
It does not impact flight characteristics. The door has not yet
ever hit the empennage. The plane has been flown intentionally
without doors.
Door loss is considered an incident, not accident and so are not
reported to the NTSB.
The factory design is better than you give credit for.
In many countries experimental aircraft builders have freedom to
experiment. There are three rules worth considering:
1: Everything is a tradeoff, a balance of risk and benefit.
2: There are always unintended consequences.
3:(my favorite, direct from B. Rutan): When considering a new
device for an aircraft, place the device in your palm, then
accelerate, said device skyward greater than 1g. If the device
returns to earth, do not install it, it is clearly too heavy!
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Ira N224XS
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