Pilot Who Survived Space Crash Says Parachute Opened Itself

The lone survivor of the Virgin Galactic Ltd. crash is out of the hospital and telling a harrowing story of how he was flung from the spacecraft and only saved when his parachute automatically deployed.

With the ship about nine miles above Earth, pilot Peter Siebold said the craft broke apart around him and he was ejected into the thin, subfreezing air still strapped to his seat. As he was falling, Siebold unbuckled himself “at some point” before the parachute opened, according to a recounting of events released today by the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board.