The Jeju Air flight 2216 disaster in South Korea brought to light the potential danger of a bird strike, i.e. the collision between an aircraft and one or more birds. Here’s how frequent and risky these phenomena are and what measures are taken to contain the damage
Among the possible causes of Jeju Air Flight 2216 disaster in South Korea, the most accredited hypotheses also include a “bird strike“. This is about the collision of the aircraft with one flock of birdsa phenomenon historically at the basis of more than one accident, and initially indicated as a possible cause of the crash of Azerbaijan Airlines flight 8243 in Kazakhstanbut in the latter case it was concluded that the damage to the aircraft was attributable to a military device. The frequency of bird strikein a world where every day more than 90,000 passenger planes and 100,000 cargo planes take to the skies, is not totally negligible, but the vast majority of the time it ends without damage or injuries. Here are probabilities, risks and countermeasures adopted by aircraft manufacturers.
case studies
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The commission birdsstrike of theEnacthe National Civil Aviation Authority, reports that in 2023, out of a total of 1,376,435 passenger flights in Italy, 2,279 of them recorded collisions with birds. Of these, 4% generated an effect on flight, e.g 2% caused damage to the aircraft. According to ENAC statistics, the phase of landing would be the one most exposed to a risk of bird strike: The 51% of the collisions with birds that occurred in 2023 in Italian airports occurred in this phase of flight. Of course, also the share has a significant impact on risks, with 62% of bird strike recorded at an altitude of zero feet and over 90% below 3,500 feet. Also to be considered is the seasonality of the phenomenon, which tends to intensify in the summer monthsreaching its peak in July, when 17.8% of total collisions with wildlife occur. Finally, the time also plays an important factor: the morning it is the time of day when most of the phenomena occur bird strikewith a considerable peak between 9:00 and 10:00, and the evening period between 17:00 and 19:00 is also exposed to a greater extent than average. As the sun goes down, the accident rate also drops. Globally, the incidence rate of the phenomenon of bird strike varies from 2.8 to 8.2 cases per 10,000 flightsdepending on the country considered, and approximately 6-7% of these phenomena have some type of impact on the flight.
the risks
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It is estimated that from 1905, the year in which the first collision of an aircraft with a bird was recorded, to today, 804 people died following a plane crash caused by a bird strike. A value that, if the hypothesis of contact with birds were to be confirmed also for the crash of the flight Jeju Air 2216would rise to 973. The most common risk posed by a bird strike is the engine failure of the aircraft: ENAC reports that, compared to 160 ingestions of birds into aircraft engines, 22 of them reported damage. This usually happens when the mass of animals sucked in by the thruster is such as to damage at least one shovel of the turbine, generating a “cascade” effect which can also lead to the destruction of the engine or a fire. This, for example, is what happened on the fly US Airways 1549protagonist of the well-known ditching in the river Hudson of 2009. Even military aviation is not exempt from the risk of bird strikes: among the most recent cases in the news, the tragic crash of the MB339-A of the Frecce Tricolori at Turin Caselle airport in 2023.
prevention
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The bird strike, especially when combined with one or more other problematic unforeseen events, is still today among the main factors in aircraft accidents. For this reason, theEasa el’Faathe European Aviation Agency and the US equivalent respectively, require that any new aircraft be able to withstand impact with an object up to 1.8 kilograms of mass at any point on the aircraft. Furthermore, the engines of the most recent airliners are equipped with a system of automatic shutdown in the event of a collision with an object weighing more than 1.8 kg, to limit damage from bird strikes. However, this highlights how risky it can be to come across a large flock of birds at low altitude: in the case of2009 Hudson River splashdownbirds ended up in both engines, causing them to shut down. For this reason, it is crucial to also act “from the ground”, with reports via control tower of any flocks in potentially dangerous positions and activities containment of fauna. As ENAC highlights, there are many measures adopted by individual airports, such as the use of radio-controlled gas cannons, acoustic distancing systems, laser torches and fixed or portable distress-call systems.
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