Bird Strikes At Northeast Ohio Airports

By: Brian Ivey

Airplanes flying into birds has been a problem since the start of aviation. As cities expand near the natural habitats of birds and other animals an increasing trend can be noticed.  Anywhere from 50-150 bird strikes happens per year at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport since 2004.

There were 148 bird strikes in 2010, several caused damage to aircraft. CLE Airport Commissioner Fred Szabo explained that that there are a few hundred thousand dollars of damage per year to aircraft. Commercial aircraft around the world deal with $1.2 billion of damage annually.  Cosmetic work to the outside of the fuselage or repairs to the jet engines are sometimes required.

“Damage to the aircraft is significant when an engine is involved,” Szabo said.

Below is the official data published by the Federal Aviation Administration for some of the 2013 bird strikes the occurred at Hopkins.  A full list of 2004-2013 strikes is here. CLE Birdstrikes 2004-2013

Significant damage and loss of life due to airplanes ingesting birds on the runway or once in the air is generally rare, but it does happen. Aviation bird strikes really became popular to the general public after the Miracle on the Hudson. US Airways Flight 1549 crashed into the Hudson river after flying into a flock of Canada geese following takeoff. This is a famous example where no fatalities happened.

Birds fly northward to the shores of Lake Erie starting in Spring before leaving again in Autumn. They nest near Burke Lakefront and Hopkins airports during the summer months. CLE has much higher traffic, which means they see a larger amount of strikes compared to surrounding airports.

The video story below takes a more in-depth look at the issue of planes and birds colliding.

Some airports across the country have more wildlife nearby compared to our airports in Northeast Ohio. Mitigating animals is important to keep planes and birds apart.  Kenneth Montville from PETA thinks Seattle Tacoma airport’s way of getting rid of birds would help out locally.

“They make the area around the airport unattractive to birds. They hang netting over storm water ponds, they install fencing around the airport to prevent burrowing animals from getting under ground and they have radar to detect flocks of birds,” Montville said.

Director of the Urban Wildlife Protection Program at The Humane Society, John Hadidian, explained that research is being done to help keep the birds from flying near aircraft. New technology is needed.

“With the new aircraft, they are pretty quiet. The birds need to know they are there so that they can avoid them themselves. So they are using different strobes and different ways of alerting birds. Visually is probably the way you need to do this,” Hadidian said.

With the new methods being implemented, the number of bird strikes across the country should decrease in the coming years. If you want to see FAA bird strike data for your local airport, click here.

You can contact the reporter by email at bivey1@kent.edu or on Twitter @weatherguy10