The maker's of the movie, Mission to Mars, came up with a creative solution, but even they didn't claim that it would work very well. To get down to the surface of Mars (which is somewhat comparable to your airborne lifeboat scenario) they built a rugged capsule and then surrounded it with tough airbags to cushion its fall. Unfortunately, in the movie, the airbags did not survive the initial impact and that impact happened to be on the top of a mountain. When the capsule, with its slightly flattened airbags, subsequently rolled of the edge of that mountain top, then second plummet overwhelmed the capsule's design which lead to the death of one of the crew.
