However, no american industry has suffered more at the hands of our tort liability system than general aviation. No single factor – at least, not until the spiral in fuel prices – has driven the price of a private aircraft out of the reach of the average American than product liability insurance premiums. Berserk, bleeding-heart juries – ignorant about aviation going in, and twice as ignorant about it by the time plaintiff’s lawyers got through with them – have handed out ridiculous judgments against manufacturers time after time to the survivors of pilots and passengers whose pilots committed one utterly stupid misjudgment after another (usually running out of fuel and/or flying in weather conditions way beyond their skills).

I’m sorry for the family of Cory Lidle, but even this particular case of rare good sense, however too little, too late is gratifying to an old pilot who watched his aviation milieu implode at that hands of our too often deeply flawed legal system.