[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index][Subject Index][Author Index]
Re: RAPTOR/PLANE COLLISION
James R. Cunningham wrote:
>It certainly looks feasible to me. Any pilot would take it seriously. I notice
>that the tailplane was collapsed back to the front spar just as you'd expect
>it to be. I'd venture to guess that most of the nay-sayers aren't pilots and
>aren't familiar with aircraft structure. Note that the tail number is visible,
>so the accident report can be used to verify the incident. <
I agree. However being an ornithologist in the aerospace business I have on
occasion been called upon to identify the remains of birds after birdstrikes
(not a very appetizing job) and it is clear that this must have been rather a
low-speed strike. Usually the remains are much more fragmented. Low-speed
birdstrikes are incidentally not very common, at least here in Sweden, since
the birds very sensibly avoid them.
The amount of damage that a fair-sized bird like a _Buteo_ can do to even a
strongly built fighter aircraft is quite awesome. I remember a case where a
_Buteo_ hit a Viggen fighter between the airframe and an engine air intake. It
went straight throught the wall of the intake (two well-spaced dural panels).
Part of the remains ended up in the engine but the rest crossed the air intake,
went through one more panel and finally lodged against a stringer (which was
bent in the process). I tried to deform the serrated edges of the holes in the
panels by hand, but they were too strong. Admittedly this happened at ca 600
mph, but I agree that hitting a _Quetzalcoatlus_ (or _Argentavis_ for that
matter) would quite likely destroy a medium-sized aircraft.
Tommy Tyrberg