The Ministry of Transport and Communication said stakeholders should join hands in the efforts being made to ensure air transport safety.

Opening a consultative meeting organized under the title “Aircraft bird strike and wildlife hazard prevention” yesterday, Transport and Communication Minister, Kuma Diriba, said all pertinent bodies are expected to collaborate in maintaining safety of air transport as it is vital to become competent at the international level.

He said the community, governmental and non-governmental organization, as well as political leaders should contribute their shares in the efforts being made to ensure safety of air transport through preventing birds and wildlife from entering to airfield.

Ethiopian Civil Aviation Authority Director General, Gobena Guangul, on his part said that birds and wildlife sheltered at airports are becoming the main cause for airplane accident.

Ethiopia has become free from bird strike and wildlife hazard following the efforts carried out to ensure safety of air transport, he said, adding safety measures need to be carried out to promote Ethiopia’s good image in the sector.

According to Gobena, the meeting was organized with a view to designing a system that enables to address the problem effectively and establish a common forum with stakeholders.

Some seven aircraft bird strikes occurred in 2009 at various airports internationally, he noted.

It almost sounds like a joke – something out of a Bugs Bunny cartoon, maybe. But “bird strikes” are apparently a serious problem for pilots and planes. That’s, apparently, what happened to a U.S. Airways jet that was forced to land in the Hudson River after taking off New York’s LaGuardia Airport minutes before. Nobody was hurt – amazingly – but in the battle between birds and pilots, humans haven’t always fared so well against avians. Luckily, Israel is on the case, working on ways to keep birds and planes away from each other!

According to experts, bird strikes – where a bird gets sucked into a jet’s engine, discombobulating the avionics (check out the photo of what an engine hit by birds looks like) – is not all that rare, and has plagued planes and even rockets. While not common in civilian aviation, bird strikes appear to be a near-plague for military flyers, according to this website which lists dozens of crashes, ejections, and even deaths of pilots due to bird strikes (at least two Israeli pilot deaths are listed).

Because Israel is on the main north-south migratory route for birds, the IDF has been very concerned with bird strikes. According to the “Bird Strike Committee Proceedings” for 2002,

the Israeli Air Force (IAF) has focused attention in bird strike prevention on collisions between aircraft and migrating birds during low-level flight operations. Only in the last 2 years has the IAF begun to tackle the problem of reducing bird-aircraft collisions at or near airfields. A dramatic shift in thinking has led the IAF to initiate complete wildlife control programs at its airbases, featuring the employment of border collies and wildlife control officers to help eliminate the risk of wildlife collisions within the control zone (CTR) of each airfield.

As a crucial component of this program, the IAF has initiated major changes in habitat management at airfields, eliminating agricultural initiatives and undergoing large-scale modifications in airfield maintenance practices. Additionally, the IAF has altered flight and ground operations where possible to attenuate the risk imposed by birds and has coordinated efforts within various departments at each airbase to address bird strike control issues. Awareness and the resolve to eliminate wildlife hazards at its airfields are key features to the IAF’s new directive on bird strike prevention. Though still in its infancy, the IAF’s new wildlife control program has already shown dramatic improvements in the reduction of bird strike hazards at airbases.

Sikorsky has alerted operators that certificated aftermarket cast acrylic windscreens built by Bell Helicopter affiliate Aeronautical Accessories are less tolerant to impact damage than the heavier original equipment glass and stretched acrylic windscreens built by Sikorsky.

The action is a result of a 4 January accident in which a Petroleum Helicopters S-76C++ crashed en route to an oil platform in Louisiana. Both pilots and six of the seven passengers on board were killed after the 14-seat helicopter descended into a swamp after a loud noise was heard in the cockpit and the torque to both engines subsequently dropped to zero.

According to the flight data recorder, the twin-engined helicopter was cruising at 138kt (255km/h) and about 700ft (215m) altitude at the time of the loud noise picked up on the cockpit voice recorder.

Bird specialists and US National Transportation Safety Board investigators later found remnants of a “hawk variety” on the pilot-side windscreen and other parts of the helicopter, leading to speculation that the birdstrike may have caused the windscreen to shatter or implode, incapacitating one or both pilots and causing, directly or indirectly, the engine power reduction.

As a result of the findings, Sikorsky on 17 February issued an “all operators” letter revealing that the cast acrylic windscreens, available to operators under a supplemental type certificate held by Aeronautical Accessories, provide the “equivalent” level of impact tolerance as Sikorsky-provided glass and STC stretched acrylic windscreens only at speeds below 109kt.

The NTSB says Petroleum, per normal procedure, had removed the original laminated glass windscreens after the helicopter was purchased two years ago to convert the aircraft to “operational mission status”, which includes the lighter cast acrylic replacement.

The speed threshold is not a limit to helicopter operations by law because there was no US Federal Aviation Administration requirement for bird strike resistance when the helicopter was certificated, says Sikorksy.

Given its need to certificate helicopters for North Sea operators, however, Sikorsky had designed and tested the glass and stretched acrylic windscreens to handle collisions with 1kg (2.2lb) birds at the helicopter’s top speed of 155kt according to more stringent UK civil airworthiness standards.

As investigators continue to probe an Air France crash in the Atlantic Ocean, US officials are looking into a January bird strike on US Airways Flight 1549. The jet collided with a flock of geese shortly after take off from New York City. The dramatic landing in the Hudson River by Captain “Sully” Sullenberger saved all 155 people on board. Now scientists at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington have identified the birds responsible.

Canadian geese to blame

Scientists have examined the feather remains from the engines of US Airways Flight 1549 and determined that migrating Canadian geese are to blame.

Thousands of bird strikes happen each year in the United States, costing the airlines billions of dollars and putting passengers at risk.

Carla Dove is a forensic ornithologist in the Smithsonian’s Feather Identification Lab. It is her job to identify the species that are sucked into aircraft engines.

“The information we provide on species identification allows engineers to determine the weights of birds,” Dove said. “So when they design a new engine they take into account the weights of the bird that are ingested into these engines.”

Dove says Canadian geese weigh on average 3.6 kilograms (eight pounds), but that the average engine is designed only to withstand a bird half that size.

Solution includes redesigning engines

Just as windshields have been redesigned to withstand bird impacts, Dove says engines might also need to be redesigned, though refitting them is a costly undertaking.

Peter Marra works at Smithsonian’s Migratory Bird Center at the National Zoo. He analyzed the feathers to determine if the geese were resident or migratory.

Marra says a cold snap in January blanketed the New York region in snow and likely played a factor in the geese’s movement, putting them on a collision course with Flight 1549.

“What you need to realize is that Canada geese are essentially flying cows and they are grazers,” Marra said. “They depend on open grassy fields to feed and forage, and when that area gets covered in snow they’re forced to move.”

He says officials will need to prevent such interference by using more sophisticated radar and doing more research on where the billions of birds are going during their migrations.

“With bird strikes, there’s actually information that’s contained in these feathers that’s sort of akin to the black box voice recorder that we can use to try to inform flying in the future to minimize probability of these bird strikes,” he adds.

Although thousands of bird strikes occur each year, the Federal Aviation Administration does not require airlines to report them.

Tragic Accident Killed CFI and Student

An investigation into the night-time training accident that killed two pilots in the fall of 2007 has revealed some troubling data… with strong evidence that a goose collision contributed to the outcome. Pilot Adam Ostapenko (20), of Duluth, Minn., and CFI Annette Klosterman (22), of Seattle, were lost in this tragedy.

The Probable Cause report states that, “The accident flight was the third of a three-leg dual instructional night cross-country flight. The airplane was established in normal cruise flight at 4,500 feet mean sea level (msl) when the airplane abruptly departed controlled flight and impacted a bog. The bog was about 15 to 20 feet deep, with a thin layer of vegetation floating on the surface. The airplane came to rest inverted, and damage to the airframe was consistent with an inverted impact to the surface of the bog. Data recovered from the airplane’s flight display system indicated that the airplane was in stable flight on a 320-degree magnetic heading, at 4,500 feet msl, and approximately 160 knots true airspeed prior to the accident, when it abruptly departed from controlled flight. The airplane rolled approximately 20 degrees left wing down, yawed to the left about 30 degrees, and simultaneously pitched nose-down about 40 degrees. It then reversed and immediately entered a descending, right roll for the duration of the flight. The airplane impacted the bog within 30 seconds of the upset. The post accident examination noted that the left half of the horizontal stabilator was bent upward approximately 90 degrees, inconsistent with the damage to the remainder of the airframe. This damage was consistent with the initial left yaw and nose down pitch recorded during the upset. In addition, a depression and tear were observed on the upper wing skin near the left wing tip. Microscopic examination and DNA testing of material on the inside surface of the wing skin was identified as remains of a Canada goose. The natural history of this species was consistent with the location, time, and date of the accident.”

The aircraft’s problems seemed to have happened “abruptly.” According to the investigating report, the Seminole’s (file photo, below)  Avidyne avionics “normally retain flight parameters in non-volatile memory within the Primary Flight Display (PFD) and Multifunction Display (MFD) units. Download of the data associated with the MFD was not successful due to damage sustained in the accident. Download of the PFD data was successful, however.”

The PFD data indicated that the airplane was in stable flight on a 320-degree magnetic heading, at 4,500 feet msl, and approximately 160 knots true airspeed prior to the accident. About 2211:46, the airplane abruptly departed from controlled flight. It rolled approximately 20 degrees left wing down, yawed to the left about 30 degrees, and simultaneously pitched nose down about 40 degrees. The airplane then reversed and immediately entered a descending, right roll for the duration of the flight. The recorded data ended about 2212:10.

A section of upper wing skin was taken from near the left wing tip, at a point about mid-chord. The post accident examination noted the presence of material on the inside surface of the wing skin inconsistent with those used in the construction of an aircraft. The wing skin section was along a tear in the skin, adjacent to the spar. This portion of the airplane was submerged in the bog after the accident until recovery of the airplane.

Microscopic examination and DNA testing by forensic ornithologists identified the material on the wing skin section as remains of a Canada goose. The ornithologists further noted that the natural history of this species was consistent with the location, time and date of the accident.

Of additional note, in the NTSB data, was an observation concerning a portion of the wreckage, “The left half of the stabilator was bent upward approximately 90 degrees at the tip, which was inconsistent with the damage to the remainder of the airframe. The inboard leading edge skin was torn from the spar. The spar was deformed but appeared otherwise intact. The stabilator section remained attached to the airframe by the spar, remaining stabilator skin aft of the spar, and the anti-servo trim tab.”

The NTSB reports added some interesting info to this report: Analysis of bird strike data from 1990 through 2004 by the United States Department of Agriculture, Wildlife Services, determined that 74 percent of bird strikes occurred within 500 feet of the ground, 19 percent between 500 feet agl and 3,500 feet agl, and 7 percent above 3,500 feet. Of the 26 percent of bird strikes that occurred above 500 feet, about 7 times more strikes occurred at night than during daylight hours. This was due to the fact that about 61 percent of the reported strikes above 500 feet agl occurred at night while only 18 percent of aircraft movements occurred at night. In addition, a proportionally higher incidence of strikes occurred between September and November, and between April and May, as compared to the number of flight operations.

Further review of the data indicated that the probability of a bird strike decreased by 32 percent for every 1,000-foot increase in altitude. Outside of the airport environment, the altitude zone from 500 feet agl to 3,500 feet agl was the most hazardous, especially at night.

Canada geese were attributed to 668 strikes with civil aircraft between 1990 and 2002. Of those strikes, 112 resulted in substantial damage to the aircraft. The average mass of a Canada goose is 9.2 lbs for a male and 7.8 lbs for a female, with a maximum mass of 13.8 lbs. This species exhibits strong flocking behavior.

The University of North Dakota provided additional pilot training regarding bird strike hazards and mitigation. In addition, they recommended to all of their pilots and flight instructors that when possible higher cruise altitudes should be selected, especially on night cross-country flights, in order to minimize the probability of a bird strike.

The NTSB’s Probable Cause determinations states that “An in-flight collision with at least one Canada goose, and the resulting damage to the left stabilator that caused the airplane to become uncontrollable. Contributing to the accident was the night lighting condition, which precluded any possibility of the flight crew seeing the bird(s) prior to impact.”

http://www.ntsb.gov/ntsb/brief.asp?ev_id=20071102X01708&key=1

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The manifestations of the problems are the presence of obsolete equipment/facilities, unviable airports, poor revenue generation, poor manpower, low productivity and backlog of debts, among others. For instance, while the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN) from records makes average annual revenue of N25billion from internally generated revenue, it requires more than this amount to service personnel and overhead costs, including the maintenance of physical assets and facilities such as tarmac, landside, and terminal buildings.

The Authority cannot also shirk its responsibilities of ensuring the maintenance of vehicle and mechanical equipment, civil and pavement maintenance, airfield lighting system/apron/street/terminal building electrical and electronics maintenance, grass-cutting and landscaping of airports and safety management system on aircraft/aerodromes. It has to contend with aged and obsolete facilities at the nation’s airports. Amidst all these challenges, the airlines, which continue to explore the growing and lucrative Nigerian market and collect airport service charge on behalf of FAAN are not helping the Authority in its bid to develop the airports.

The airlines, records from FAAN show, currently owe the Authority over N4billion arising from unpaid landing and parking charges. Interestingly, while the airlines continue to give excuses for their failure to pay their debts, they are vocal in their criticisms of FAAN on the poor state of the airports. In the best interest of the operators, FAAN has spent over N1billion on measures aimed at combating bird strike, a menace to safety and security of air travel. Some of the airlines and government agencies operating at the airports default in payment of sundry bills such as electricity bills. FAAN as the ‘big brother’ is contrained to clear the bills, yet waiting endlessly for defrayment from the defaulters.

To do otherwise is to have the airports in utter darkness. It is lamentable that the Authority pays an average of N45m monthly on electricity bill just for the Lagos airport. The Authority also spends an average of N17.4m monthly on diesel and petrol for the generators at the airport. What FAAN pays to sustain the other 20 airports is better imagined. Another perennial challenge faced by FAAN is government’s policy inconsistency.

A situation where we have instability in leadership of the Authority, with the appointment of eight managing directors within 10 years, does not augur well for continuity, clear-cut focus and meaningful development of the agency. Some projects, including airport and car park concession by FAAN to some private firms, on the directive of the Federal Government, have been inimical to the revenue generation of the organisation. The federal allocation from the government, meant for capital projects, cannot take care of the increasing financial challenges at the airports. FAAN, for instance, would require over N3billion to resurface a runway of about 3,000metres. This gives a faint idea of the colossal amount required should FAAN contemplate the resurfacing of the 22 runways across the country.

Coming with an avant-garde approach, the Managing Director of FAAN, Richard Aisuebeogun, who came on board in November 2007, mobilised his lieutenants and the entire workforce, who had hitherto been disenchanted, and tasked them to reposition the organisation for contemporary challenges and realities. To Aisuebeogun, the workers needed to be creative, and should be able to proffer practical solutions to the agency’s problems in order for FAAN to live up to the status of a true service provider in the aviation industry. With the synergy, Aisuebeogun, in the course of this year, drew a new business strategy, which aims at transforming the Authority to an improved service-oriented company. The strategy is in line with Federal Government’s port reform programme with the vision of providing a safe, secure and efficient transportation system for the country.

The implementation of the business plan, in the short, medium and long terms, has, barely a year of the Aisuebeogun’s administration, seen the completion of the seemingly jinxed Port Harcourt Airport’s runway. Domestic and international flight operations resumed at the airport more than a year after the airport went on recess following the irreparable loss of 109 people in a crash at the airport on December 10, 2005. With the limited resources at its disposal, the administration also contracted Siemen’s ADB Airfield Lighting System for the installation of the Airfield Lighting System at the airport at the cost of N920m.

The contractor has promised to complete the first phase of the work in December 2008. At the MMA, which has a record of 23 airlines operating 18 flights daily at the over 30 year-old airport, the facilities are unarguably overstretched. With no fewer than 4,052 passengers using the airport daily, it is only fair to commend the leadership of FAAN and the MMA for sustaining the operations of the airport up to this day. The airport is once more made a conducive place for passengers, with the provision of 2,800 new seats at the departure hall of the terminal. The incessant congestion at the airport is currently being addressed with the ongoing expansion of the departure hall. The same could be said of the temporary car park at the MMA. The permanent one has already been concessioned out.

Following the occasional problem experienced with air conditioning system at the airport, Aisuebeogun recently reassured the public that arrangements were in the pipeline to overhaul the facilities at the airport. Presently, the three chillers at the terminal are working well; this has brought about improved cooling system at the terminal. Plans, according to the management of FAAN, are under way to add more to the air conditioning units at the airport. The toilets at the airports have also been improved upon. The management of FAAN, according to Aisuebeogun, is determined to ensure the regular payment of its contractors responsible for the cleaning of the airport’s toilets.

Without dismissing the calls for improvement on the four screening machines at the MMIA terminal, the Aisuebeogun leadership has successfully sustained the serviceability of the four screening machines at the MMIA terminal and the three at the central screening are working well. The conference room of the airport has been totally refurbished with new carpets, window blinds and tables.

Out of the 14 aviobridges, the only one that is not serviceable is being fixed to meet the evolving challenges of wide-bodied aircraft in the country. FAAN has also intensified efforts in reducing the incidence of bird strike at the airport by cutting grasses regularly. The aesthetics of the terminal has improved with the new painting of walls and road divider at the airport. The airport has also serviced two boreholes to improve water supply. One distinguishing style of the incumbent administration is its partnership with state governments. This relationship has been symbiotic. For instance, the relationship is paying off in Kaduna State with the completion of work on the Kaduna Airport’s runway. In Kano, FAAN would, in due course, complete the domestic terminal building. The completion of civil works on the second runway at the MMA, 18L, before the end of 2008. The management of FAAN has also concluded arrangements with a Singaporean firm, which put in place the carousels at the MMA, to rehabilitate it.

The leadership of the authority, however, contemplates embracing the Public-Private Participation towards replacing the old conveyors with more sophisticated and efficient ones. Also as a result of the collective commitment to the development of the nation’s airports, the Rivers State Government recently donated a fire tender to FAAN. The NDDC was not insensitive to the yearnings of the airport as it donated to it a 500KVA generator. The FAAN management has lately installed three 1000KVA and three 500KVA generators.

It is also replacing the old transformers at the airport with new ones. The Niger State Government has also risen to the challenge of supporting FAAN for effective service delivery. The government recently donated two fire tenders to FAAN. Absolutely committed to ensuring safety and promoting the highest level of aviation standards in the land, the present FAAN management in spite of its financial predicament, particularly with airport maintenance funding, has succeeded in settling a substantial part of its over N20billion debt inherited from its predecessors.

More improvement on the state of the airports could be accomplished if FAAN is given the required support in the exploration of the non-aeronautical avenues to boost its revenue base. With that, the resort to a lifeline from government would not in any way arise.

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At the meeting organized by Safety Flight Office of Comando Scuole, finalized to an initial valuation of capability of robot to face the ‘Bird strike’ problem, was present Gen. Air Squadron Giampiero Gargini, Captain of Comando Scuole/3rd Air Unit in Bari.

At the illustrative briefing of Raptor Internacional, that has realized the model, is followed a demonstration in flight of the radio-controlled model with the Astore’s falcon aspect, which has repulsed in a few minutes the different species of birds present on airport, in which the demonstration has been organized”.

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