Study: No Simple Way To Prevent Bird Strikes

A passenger aircraft on approach to Newark's Liberty International Airport runs into a flock of snow geese. Passengers are frightened at the sound of impacts on the hull and one engine is shut down before the plane lands safely. A Boeing 737 climbing out after departure from Lambert Field (MO) hits three snow geese, causing over a half-million dollars in damage. An American Airlines Super-80 climbing out after departure from Chicago's O'Hare International hits a double-breasted cormorant, causing a fire in the number one engine and scaring the hell out of passengers before it makes it safely back to the airport.

More and more, civil aircraft in the US are getting the bird. In 1990, the FAA reported 2,175 bird strikes. By last year, that number had more than tripled, to 6,819. And consider that as many as 80-percent of bird strikes are never reported.

Very few of these mid-air collisions between birds and planes result in death (to anyone but the bird, that is). Blame quieter aircraft, blame the growing number of birds -- as evidenced by last week's strike involving that cormorant and an AAL MD-81 carrying 107 people out of O'Hare.

But the truth is, while there are more birds in the air, there are many more aircraft up there as well. In 1980, there were 17,800,000 commercial and military flights over the US. By 2003, that number had climbed to 28,100,000.

At a recent conference on bird strikes in Baltimore (MD), experts said they were worried that the number of strikes could climb again in 2004.

"We're making airports as unattractive and uncomfortable for wildlife as possible," said Richard Dolbeer, chairman of the conference sponsor, Bird Strike Committee USA. It's a consortium of government and aviation officials aimed at reducing the number and effects of bird-meets-plane incidents all over the country.

But Dolbeer said there are no "silver bullets" to deal with the problem. Until one comes up, bird strikes will continue to imperil pilots and passengers and cause upwards of $600 million damage to US aircraft every year.

FMI: www.birdstrike.org