Comments on: Heard about the Bird?

By: Bruce Landsberg

Bruce Landsberg — Sat, 29 May 2010 11:58:13 +0000

Both your experiences, echo mine. Up is usually better, landing lights on is supposed to help and thorough plugging of all openings is very helpful for aircraft parked outside although inside hangars are also vulnerable

By: Richard Depinay

Richard Depinay — Fri, 28 May 2010 16:29:03 +0000

When birds see an aircraft, they tend to fold their wings and drop.
If you can, your reflex should be to go up, while the bird goes down.

On a side note, I have had already 6 bird strikes, although with no damages or minor. Even one at night once at 10000′! I guess birds do night VMC?!

By: Kevin Collins

Kevin Collins — Wed, 26 May 2010 22:09:50 +0000

I performed a thorough pre-flight before a recent flight with an instructor to shoot some practice approaches. Before I started the engine, a finch landed on top of one of the propeller blades and peered into the cockpit at me. The finch obeyed my “prop clear” warning, so I proceeded with engine start and the rest of the routine. I didn’t appreciate the foreshadowing at the time.

During the run-up, the instructor detected a funny scent vaguely reminiscent of electrical insulation. I taxied back in, parked in a different spot, and shut down. Upon further inspection, he noticed a few bits of straw visible only when looking up towards the top of the engine cowling from in front of the plane. I was facing into the sun during the original pre-flight and didn’t think to bend down far enough to gain that particular angle, so I had not seen the sign. A mechanic removed the cowling to reveal a pristine bird’s nest sitting on top of the engine. He removed the nest, we checked around a little more, he replaced the cowling, and off we went.