Canada Geese, Migration, and Jet Engines
Today there was an interesting article on the CNN website about the ditching of US Airways Flight 1549 in New York's Hudson River on January 15. It turns out that they were able to determine that the Canada Geese that slammed into the engines of the aircraft were actually migrating from Canada, rather than local birds just up for a joyride.
The disturbing thing about the article is that it said that jet engine designers would be relieved that the geese that hit the engines were 8-pound Canada Geese and not mere 4-pound Brant Geese, because the engines are designed to survive strikes from 4-pound birds.
INSTEAD OF BEING RELIEVED, MAYBE IT'S TIME FOR THEM TO BE MOTIVATED TO DESIGN THE ENGINES TO SURVIVE STRIKES FROM 8-POUND BIRDS!!!
The disturbing thing about the article is that it said that jet engine designers would be relieved that the geese that hit the engines were 8-pound Canada Geese and not mere 4-pound Brant Geese, because the engines are designed to survive strikes from 4-pound birds.
INSTEAD OF BEING RELIEVED, MAYBE IT'S TIME FOR THEM TO BE MOTIVATED TO DESIGN THE ENGINES TO SURVIVE STRIKES FROM 8-POUND BIRDS!!!
posted by Scott @ 6/08/2009
3 comments
3 Comments:
Do you have any idea how much that would cost? Only the design of the rotating parts that would have to withstand an 8 pound impact would cost millions. What strikes me a bit though is why don't the designers think of a simple idea that would prevent the geese to cause any damage to the engine; surrounding the main parts by a simple. I'm no engine designer but it seems pretty simple to me and I don't see why it wouldn't work...
Take care, Lorne
Thanks for your comment. I don't know anything about jet engines so I don't know if you'd beef up a rotating part or install some sort of shroud or what. All I know is that millions is a small price to pay compared to the likely catastrophic loss of life and property resulting from a crash.
That's very true indeed, any price is nothing compared to the price of a human life.
Lorne
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