Bird Strike!

Jay Honeck

Jay Honeck

Touchdown! Greaser!
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Jun 6, 2008
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Ingleside, TX
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Jay Honeck
Does anyone here think you can hit a bird in flight and have no damage?

I didn't believe it either, until it happened. Here are the details:

Last week Mary and I flew a short flight over the island. Mary was PIC, and it was an entirely normal, uneventful flight. We took photos, and she made a normal landing. There was absolutely nothing out of the ordinary, and this flight was no different than the thousands that preceded it.

After pushing the plane into the hangar, I noticed something sticking out of one of the very tight (piano hinge) seams in the cowling of our RV-8A. It looked like felt, or down. I pulled it out, thought "Hmmmm...", and cracked a beer.

A week went by. In the interim, the memory of that strange piece of felt, sticking out of an impossibly tight hinged seam, rattled around in my head. So, yesterday (again, horrible flying weather) I resolved to have another crack at my exhaust hangers (another story) and to have a general look-around of the engine compartment.

Here's what I found, on a closer inspection from the outside:

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Here's what we found inside. The whole bird was there, but it was beheaded:

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It went cleanly through the prop into the starboard intake without so much as scratching the paint:

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The inside of the cowling was bloody, but undamaged:

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How did it get through that whirling prop? We never saw, felt, or heard a thing:

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We were very lucky. Had that bird hit the wheel pant or the windshield, I suspect this would be a tale of woe. Instead, we spent some quality time cleaning bloody feathers out of every nook and cranny (including a few in the oil cooler and a couple inside the carb heat scat tubing), and thanking our lucky stars for small favors.

Fly safe, kids. I'd tell you to watch out for birds, but we never saw the danged thing. :lol:
 
Glad it did nothing more than make a mess. A friend described a bird strike on the windshield of his Lanceair (the certificated version) as a bug smear on steroids. Lots of 'em. Same as you, made a gross mess without any obvious damage.
 
Matthew said:
Ugh. Happy cleaning.

By the way, that goo left behind after a bird strike is called "snarge".

If you want to, you can mail in samples to the Smithsonian Institution:

http://www.faa.gov/airports/airport_safety/wildlife/smithsonian/

There's even an FAA advisory circular that describe how to collect the samples:

http://www.faa.gov/airports/resourc...o/document.current/documentNumber/150_5200-32
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Yeah, someone told me about that reporting site, unfortunately after I had already discarded the carcass. I had no idea there was a government agency to examine bird strike remains.
 
steingar said:
Glad it did nothing more than make a mess. A friend described a bird strike on the windshield of his Lanceair (the certificated version) as a bug smear on steroids. Lots of 'em. Same as you, made a gross mess without any obvious damage.
Click to expand...

I always imagined that a bird strike would be more dramatic.

I'm glad it wasn't, although I have to wonder what would have happened to CHTs if we were on a long flight? Would we have had a hot cylinder, where that bird carcass was a-cooking?

And, of course, over the course of a two hour flight, would the oil cooler have slowly filled with (and been clogged by) feathers? Dunno. :dunno:

My guess is that this happened when Mary was landing, flying at approach speeds. I have a hard time believing that the bird would have been so intact if we had hit it in cruise flight.
 
Jay Honeck said:
Here's what we found inside. The whole bird was there, but it was beheaded...

It went cleanly through the prop into the starboard intake without so much as scratching the paint...
Click to expand...

Maybe the fan beheaded it...?
 
lemme ask this.....is there any chance at all, that the bird was already INSIDE the cowl, and after engine start, the bird tried to get OUT and get his head wacked off? :dunno: I dunno.
 
Looks like it worked out perfectly. Do damage and you have a nice bird dinner already cooked
 
Jay Honeck said:
I always imagined that a bird strike would be more dramatic.

I'm glad it wasn't, although I have to wonder what would have happened to CHTs if we were on a long flight? Would we have had a hot cylinder, where that bird carcass was a-cooking?

And, of course, over the course of a two hour flight, would the oil cooler have slowly filled with (and been clogged by) feathers? Dunno. :dunno:

My guess is that this happened when Mary was landing, flying at approach speeds. I have a hard time believing that the bird would have been so intact if we had hit it in cruise flight.
Click to expand...

I agree. Most birds fly at very low altitudes such that you're only likely to hit one during approach or climb when your airspeed is relatively low.

But I've seen hawks up at altitudes of I'd guess 1500' to 2000' AGL and higher. Those things get your attention but not until they are pretty close.

When I was in Civil Air Patrol, one of my squadron's 182s took a bird strike to the right wing and put a huge hole through the leading edge. I think I remember them saying it was a hawk. That could have been bad news had it hit the windscreen.

Glad your incident amounted to nothing worse than a grizzly cleanup!
 
petrolero said:
I agree. Most birds fly at very low altitudes such that you're only likely to hit one during approach or climb when your airspeed is relatively low.

But I've seen hawks up at altitudes of I'd guess 1500' to 2000' AGL and higher. Those things get your attention but not until they are pretty close.

When I was in Civil Air Patrol, one of my squadron's 182s took a bird strike to the right wing and put a huge hole through the leading edge. I think I remember them saying it was a hawk. That could have been bad news had it hit the windscreen.

Glad your incident amounted to nothing worse than a grizzly cleanup!
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You're forgetting migratory birds. Seminole hit a goose at 8000 at night, both pilots died.

Hawks do get up there, Ive seen them around 2500 feet in a thermal with them.
 
Long flight? You might have wondered why you were both craving chicken...
 
Jay Honeck said:
Does anyone here think you can hit a bird in flight and have no damage?
Click to expand...
It's definitely possible. I know because it happened to me. I was in cruise, returning home from a dinner jaunt to Indiana, when somewhere just west of ADG I heard a BANG! like a meteor had hit the plane. There was no change in the flight characteristics, no other signs of trouble, so I finished the trip normally and landed at home (probably not too wise, but I didn't want to get stuck at a field with mechanics I knew nothing about, in case there was something that needed attention). Upon landing, this is what I found:
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No sign of the bird itself, just a huge mess to clean off. And most importantly: no damage at all to the airplane, other than a bit of scratched paint from where either the beak or talons apparently dug in on their way back. My mechanic's best guess was that the bird went straight through the prop arc without hitting the prop itself, just as in your case. I did a back of the envelope calculation later showing that this was in fact a fairly likely outcome of a small bird's trip through the prop arc at a relative speed of ~120 kts.

BTW for those who think this only happens at low altitudes: this was at about 2800 AGL, and nowhere near water or marshland nesting/feeding grounds.
 

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Jay..... Glad there is no damage....:yes:...

As warm as it is in Texas, I am amazed there was no smell after sitting for a week under the cowling all chopped up like that...
 
Sure, it can happen. I had one just before I soloed for the first time. We hit that bird with the prop. No damage to the plane, but it sure wrecked the bird's day. One of the small swallow type birds who hang out at KOLM. He zigged when he should have zagged.
 
N801BH said:
Jay..... Glad there is no damage....:yes:...

As warm as it is in Texas, I am amazed there was no smell after sitting for a week under the cowling all chopped up like that...
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We had an abnormally cold week here, with temps in the 40s. I thinks that's what saved us from the stench.
 
Jay,

Looks like the feathers and small swatch of yellow of a meadow lark or field lark. Had lots of them in the yard here in Victoria lately. Good chance he was along the runway, power pulled back, made it between the blades, probably easy to miss with the tail down, maybe even on your flare.

Dale
 
dalealan said:
Jay,

Looks like the feathers and small swatch of yellow of a meadow lark or field lark. Had lots of them in the yard here in Victoria lately. Good chance he was along the runway, power pulled back, made it between the blades, probably easy to miss with the tail down, maybe even on your flare.

Dale
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Hmmm...
Looks more like a Yellow Bellied Sap Sucker..... A VERY rare and endangered bird that is on the endangered list..... Fines for killing one are $500,000.00 per bird.......

Too bad ol Jay posted a pic of the carcass on the internet....:yikes::hairraise:...........:D
 
2hrs into my insurance check out on my new-to-me Viking I found a beak and head attached to what looked like a an intestine on the oil cooler. Never felt a thing...
 
Glad it was a non event for you.

I try to climb over any birds I can see.

I read birds natural tendency is to fold their wings and let gravity take over when they feel threatened, so normally they'll dive. So I want to go up and away.:redface:
 
I went through an entire flock of geese once in the Flybaby. They were EVERYWHERE. Zipping by my head and wings. Pretty terrifying in an open cockpit airplane. Didn't hit one..was very glad.
 
jesse said:
I went through an entire flock of geese once in the Flybaby. They were EVERYWHERE. Zipping by my head and wings. Pretty terrifying in an open cockpit airplane. Didn't hit one..was very glad.
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well, when they come up on you from behind they can pretty much see and avoid...
 
Dago Red hit a seagull going close to 500mph at Reno one year. It went right through the leading edge close to the fuselage leaving about a 4" diameter hole. The leading edge skins in that area are almost 1/8" thick. Needless to say the gull exploded inside the gear well and made one hell of a mess.
When Bill Lear was developing his jet he made an air gun to shoot chickens at the windshield to test it. He sent one of the guys to the store to buy some whole chicken and the guy loaded up the first one. One of the engineers and Bill were inside the plane when they signaled to fire the first chicken. It went right through the windshield missing them by inches and through a couple of bulkheads. Seems no one had noticed the guy had bought frozen chickens. Don
 
eman1200 said:
lemme ask this.....is there any chance at all, that the bird was already INSIDE the cowl, and after engine start, the bird tried to get OUT and get his head wacked off? :dunno: I dunno.
Click to expand...

Well, anything is possible, I suppose.

I haven't seen any sign of birds in our hangar, however.
 
Any damage all depends on the size of the bird, where it hits and the speed of the plane.
Once while at night returning with an Aztec, I just sensed something on the left engine. When I got back I had evidence of a bird strike on that side, it went through the prop and made a big mess on part of the prop and cowling.

Another time at 4000' over MSP and doing 250kts, we took a duck down the right side of the plane. It bounced off the nose and left a dent, and then it took out the landing light in the leading edge wing root which left some chips in the paint on the bottom of the engine cowling from the landing light lens cover.
 
Jay Honeck said:
Does anyone here think you can hit a bird in flight and have no damage?
Click to expand...

Hit a bird at pattern altitude in a 172 once, it glanced off the curved portion of the windscreen at the left edge. No harm, no foul.
 
eman1200 said:
[L]emme ask this[:] is there any chance at all[] that the bird was already INSIDE the cowl, and after engine start, the bird tried to get OUT and g[o]t his head w[h]acked off?
Click to expand...

That would be my guess. The bird looks baked, not pulverized.
 
I've had vultures go over me at 4500' MSL in central Florida. So that's darn near 4500' AGL.

My primary instructor said "Don't dodge them. They'll dodge you." So far, so good. But I'm not as confident now that he was telling the truth.

Glad there was no damage to Amelia and more importantly you & Mary.


John
 
Look at the bright side, now you don't have to buy a Turkey for Thanksgiving and you can use the Snarge as gravy :rofl:

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I hit one last year very soon after getting my private. I was climbing out of KSLR going back to KTKI and heard a loud noise. Started looking at the wings and then realized it hit the windshield! Luckily, I was in a 150 and it was a small bird that hit the upper right hand corner of the windshield near the wing where it's all curved and (I'm assuming, more rigid). If i can figure our how to upload pictures I'll post them. All it did was left some scratches on the plexiglass and ruined a pair of my underpants
 
A guy bringing a Lance into IXD last year, at night, had a bird come through the windscreen and splatter all over the rear seat and bulkhead. He got a pretty bad cut on his hand from a piece of Lexan. I think he was on about a 2-mile final. He did a good job of 'flying the plane' because something like that could have easily been much, much worse.
 
Connecticut license plate? Surprised there isn't a pedestrian sticking out of the grill...
 
Seanaldinho said:
You're forgetting migratory birds. Seminole hit a goose at 8000 at night, both pilots died.

Hawks do get up there, Ive seen them around 2500 feet in a thermal with them.
Click to expand...

Good point. They can bring down airliners.
 
I hit one once in a Cub by KPOU. I never saw it, but I heard and felt it. I was concerned enough about it that I landed and inspected, but other than the snarge, everything was fine with the Cub. With the bird, not so much.

Rich
 
Are birds required to have ADS-B by 2020?

I don't think the birds have good lobbyists in Washington so I say we try and push it through. If they want to use the airspace everyone should play by the same rules.
 
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