Location Transport

Are airports doing enough to stop potentially catastrophic bird strikes?

Bird Strike Forces Emergency Landing At LaGuardia AA Flight 1256, Headed Towards NYC Airport From Miami, Landed Safely After Collision With Birds Nose Hydraulics Damaged, Large Bird Found In Landing Gear Reporting John Slattery NEW YORK (CBS) ― Click to enlarge1 of 1 American Airlines Flight 1256, a Boeing 737 en route to LaGuardia Airport, landed safely after declaring a bird strike about 900 feet before it landed on June 30, 2009. CBS Close numSlides of totalImages Related Slideshows Celebs Who Lean To The Right Devastating Plane Crashes The Incredible Megan Fox -- Then & Now Celebrities In Playboy Openly Gay Celebrities 2009 Celebrity Deaths, Jan.-June Jessica Simpson: Then & Now Best Picture Blunders Hooray For The Red, White And Zooom! Hottest Celebrity Moms Related StoriesNYC To Gas 2,000 Geese In Bid To Protect Aircraft (6/11/2009) FAA: Bird Strikes Have Doubled At 13 Airports (4/24/2009) FAA Call To Keep Bird Strikes Private Raises Brows (3/27/2009) Pilot 'Sully' Describes 'Shocking' Thuds Of Geese (2/9/2009) NTSB Confirms Bird Strike In NYC Jet Crash (2/5/2009) On Tuesday at LaGuardia Airport another airliner had a mid-air bird strike. The plane landed safely, but the strike damaged the nose gear. American Airlines Flight 1256 from Miami was on the ground, after reporting a bird strike approaching the airport at 900 feet. Kelly Ruiz was one of the 135 passengers aboard. "It's pretty shocking. I had no idea," Ruiz said, adding that the flight crew mentioned nothing of the incident. It was just before 11 a.m. when the strike occurred. Once the pilot landed, he noticed that the nose gear's hydraulics was not working. The plane, a 737-800, was towed to a gate. The passengers safely got off, and a large bird was found in the landing gear. A captain on his way to Dallas said he's had a bird strike, but years ago. "In the Air Force, flew military, I did, but at American Airlines I didn't have any trouble. Oh yeah, we get our heads out and we're looking all the time," pilot Christopher Sweesy said. Of course, it's all reminiscent of what happened last January in the Miracle on the Hudson. That's when a US Airways Airbus hit birds and lost both engines forcing a remarkable landing in the Hudson. All 155 aboard survived. Mayor Michael Bloomberg recently said the city will trap and gas 2,000 Canada geese this summer in public parks near the airports. One former National Transportation Safety Board official supports the removal of birds. "The potential is always there for a dramatic accident as opposed to something like where a landing gear got stuck once they were down on the ground," Ira Furman said. Passengers are generally unaware of bird strikes, but at LaGuardia there were 98 bird strikes last year alone. Also under consideration is radar to spot flocks of birds in order to divert planes away from them. The Federal Aviation Administration list of wildlife strikes, published on the Internet, details more than 89,000 incidents since 1990, including 28 cases since 2000 when a collision with a bird or other animal such as a deer on a runway was so severe that the aircraft was considered destroyed.

Public Comments

1. No. Most states prohibit shooting problem birds outside of hunting season.
2. 90,000 incidents in the last 19 years. In every 24 hour period in the United States there are roughly 48,000 planes in the air (flightaware.com). 19 years is 6,935 days is 332,880,000 planes in the air since 1990. 90,000/332,880,000 is 0.027% of flights. And that is 0.027% of flights that encounter a wildlife strike not 0.027% of flights that have some sort of catastrophic failure due to that strike. 28 cases in the last 9 years that were so catastrophic that they destroyed the aircraft? 9 years is 3,285 days is 157,680,000. 28/157,680,000 is 1.776*10^-5% (or 0.00001776%) of flights. I'm sure they're doing enough. Oh shit, I didn't even read the whole article. They're killing 2,000 geese? Leave our geese alone! Damn Yanks.
3. you dont have to shoot them, its CRUAL, IN FRANCE THEY PLACE DIFFERENT SOUND SYSTEM TO ALERT THEM TO AVOID THE AREA, ITS LIKE FOR THE MICE, THEY PUT A SOUND SYSTEM WITH VIBRATIONS WHICH IS THE MOST EFFICIENT SOLUTION, PEOPLE WHO KILL ALL TYPES OF ANIMALS FOR THEIR COMFORT ARE ALREADY SPIRITUALLY DEAD. IN 2009, PEOPLE HAVE TO STOP KILLING... OKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK UNLESS HE OR SHE S A CAVE/MAN OR CAVE WOMAN.....
4. so you would plainly smite all birds sized duck or larger... right? most of the bird strikes are from small birds (sparrow, swallow, robin) you cannot do much about larger migrating birds, such as crows, rooks, and gulls apart from reducing their feeding opportunities in the vicinity of the airbase (here, the most efficient solution is reducing of ammounts of dumped food, btw) you cannot do anything about large birds like swans. they're heavy, and stupid enough to hit a newly built building in their usual flight path.