I've been on this forum for about 5+ years. Former airline pilot, now working in LE related field. The cirrus has a ballistic parachute - sounds like it deployed, but that only helps with a fair bit of altitude. If the airplane was at a low altitude when they either had (1) engine failure or (2) a stall (despite what you read in the media ALL the time, plane engines rarely "stall",
it's the wing - it's the name for when the wing loses lift due to insufficient airspace or a high angle of bank at a certain speed, known as an accelerated stall) the parachute wouldn't have helped.
If they stalled and dove into the water when the wing quit flying or stalled and spun in (as opposed to attempted a water landing), it's like hitting a wall in your vehicle at 70+ mph and aircraft are designed to be lightweight, not built like cars to protect the occupants. The pilot and passenger likely died or were rendered unconscious on impact with the water, and didn't suffer. If the pilot had airspeed to keep flying, but not enough power and attempted a "ditching" they might have survived but from what I read this does not appear to be what was witnessed.
I couldn't find either of them in the
www.faa.gov airman records - not uncommon sometimes pilots don't update their state of residence so a search won't find them using their current name and residence state, and sometimes the media mis-spells a name. On Monday the FAA site updates the accident data for the weekend - that will give some more information on the details and the aircraft registration info.
My condolences to their family - it's still safer than driving, as I always told my parents when I was starting out, but accidents do happen, tragically so.
