Patent 10569889 was granted and assigned to Kitty Hawk on February, 2020 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
A selection is made between single stage and multistage parachute deployment for a vehicle based at least in part on vehicle state information. In the event multistage parachute deployment is selected, a drogue parachute is deployed during a first deployment stage and afterwards, a main parachute is deployed during a second deployment stage. In the event single stage parachute deployment is selected, at least the main parachute is deployed in a single stage where in the event the drogue parachute is deployed during the single stage, the drogue and main parachute are deployed simultaneously.