A couple posters made the statement about jumping out of a perfectly good airplane. That can’t be done except as a sport.
Choosing to launch oneself out of an aircraft might be exhilarating, but it has risks even with good equipment, instructors, and aircraft modified to accomplish the desire. But it is a sport and has nothing to do with any purpose other than sport.
Common passenger airliner doors are about 6 feet tall by 3.5 feet wide. This means that to open the door, one would need to overcome more than 24,000 pounds of pressure — about the weight of six cars or 20 polar bears. Most airliners also use “plug-type” doors that fit tightly onto the door frame.
And opening the door on say a Cessna 152 or a Beech Craft Bonanza may not affect the aerodynamics, but the door opens out so the wind rushing past the nose of the plane washes past the door preventing it from opening more than a couple of inches at best. So the old adage of jumping out of a perfectly good aircraft is a bit of a misnomer. If it came to that, a forced landing is the next step but that is not a perfectly good aircraft.
Sad it happened, but people fall climbing mountains and having a heart event in a marathon happen at about the same rate. And the most dangerous part of flying itself is the trip out to the airport in the car.
Wy69
“And opening the door on say a Cessna 152 or a Beech Craft Bonanza may not affect the aerodynamics, but the door opens out so the wind rushing past the nose of the plane washes past the door preventing it from opening more than a couple of inches at best.”
I could “steer” i.e. yaw my PA-22/108 by opening the passenger door in flight. Only a little resistance, really, at least for the first 12 inches or so.