BIRDS HIT 1 IN 10,000 FLIGHTS
Last week's dramatic crash landing of US Airways flight 1549 into the Hudson River and the heroic rescue of all passengers on board was truly a miracle. Pilot Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger has been praised as a hero, and rightfully so. His skillful landing saved the lives of over 150 people and touched the lives of countless others.
The crash resulted when the Airbus 320 collided with two birds. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) reports that brid strikes occur from time to time, but there haven't been many major accidents due to bird strikes in many years. Birds present a bigger hazard for smaller aircraft and pose a threat to commercial airliners typically only at lower altitudes when planes are taking off or landing. From 1990 to 2007, there were nearly 80,0000 reported incidents of birds striking non-military aircraft, or about one strike in every 10,000 flights.
The FAA requires airliners to withstand strikes from birds weighing as much as 8 pounds at particluarly vulnerable points along the aircraft. Kevin Poorman, a senior research engineer at the University of Dayton Research Institute in Ohio, tests the abiltiy of airplanes and engines to withstand bird strikes by firing 4 to 8 pound birds at strategic points along aircraft from coompressed gas guns at hundreds of miles per hour. Poorman noted that over 200 fatalities have occurred in the last 20 years due to bird strikes workldwide and that 5,000 impacts are reported each year. Poorman believes that birds strike planes every day, but planes are designed to take the impacts, however, when a flock or a large bird strikes at a critical moment is when problems happen -- like what happened last week in the Hudson.
Environmental initiatives of the 1960s and 1970s geared towards protecting animal species, cleaning the water and expanding wildlife refuge systems has resulted in a resurgence of birds and wildlife that pose a hazard for airplanes. During this same time period, aircraft design has improved to make planes faster and quieter, so birds can't detect them as readily.
The FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) consider bird strikes a continual concern and will continue to improve engine design to prevent crashes in the future.
