Airports' reporting of bird strikes inconsistent
— -- Reporting of potentially dangerous collisions between birds and aircraft varies widely at the nation's largest airports, with some places detailing as many as hundreds of incidents a year while others have reported only a handful since 2000, federal data show.
The inconsistent reporting undercuts the ability of federal regulators, airports and airlines to assess the risks that birds create, according to some aviation and wildlife experts. Reports to aviation regulators about bird strikes are not mandatory.
At New York's John F. Kennedy International, located next to a wetlands and wildlife preserve, airport workers make numerous reports each year of bird strikes on the airport grounds, according to Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) data. The reports averaged nearly 100 per year from 2000 through mid-2008.
But at Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson International, the world's busiest airfield, workers reported an average of 10 per year for the same period. In 2003 and 2005, the airport did not report any strikes.
"How is it that a busy airport like JFK can have all these bird strikes, but another busy airport like Atlanta can't have any?" says Paul Eschenfelder, an airline pilot who teaches airport wildlife control. "I think there's a reporting problem there."
Hartsfield spokesman John Kennedy says he could not explain why the number of reports was so low. The airport is "very aggressive" about its wildlife control program and reports every incident it learns about, he says.
The FAA had initially sought to prevent public access to its bird database, arguing that airports, airlines and pilots might be less likely to report incidents if those reports became public. The agency reversed itself and released the data Friday. Interest in risks from birds has swelled since a US Airways jet struck a flock of geese near New York City and was forced to ditch in the Hudson River on Jan. 15. All 155 on board survived.
Collisions between birds and aircraft serious enough to cause substantial damage have occurred at nearly all of the nation's large commercial airports and have increased dramatically since 1990, according to the federal data released Friday.
USA TODAY analyzed only those reports in the database that were made by airports. They include cases of bird carcasses being found next to runways or airport employees spotting a plane hitting a bird. They don't include reports by airlines, pilots or air-traffic controllers.
Most large airports had hundreds of such reports since 2000. Denver, Chicago O'Hare, Phoenix Sky Harbor and Dallas/Fort Worth each reported more than 300 bird strikes since 2000.
Aggressive reporting is a critically important way to assess the threat from birds, says David Ishihara, director of aviation operations at Boston's Logan. Logan had 241 bird strike reports since 2000.
"We need to know when, where" birds hit planes, Ishihara says.
By contrast, Palm Beach International staff haven't reported a single bird incident at the airport since 2000, the data show. Spokeswoman Casandra Davis says reports to the FAA are voluntary and "finding a dead bird on your airport is not reportable."
Las Vegas McCarran, Tampa and Nashville all reported 10 or fewer bird strikes since 2000, according to the data.
Because of concerns over lack of reporting, the National Transportation Safety Board in 1999 called on the FAA to make reporting mandatory. The recommendation by accident investigators was rejected by the FAA.
Richard Dolbeer, a retired Agriculture Department biologist who developed the FAA's bird strike database, says the data suggest that "some airports are doing a much better job of reporting than others."
Dolbeer says it's in an airport's interest to aggressively monitor all bird activity. "If you cannot define the problem, you cannot solve it."