
Drone Almost Hits Commercial Jet at 4,000 Feet at LAX - aaronbrethorst
http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/Drone-Almost-Hits-Commercial-Jet-at-4000-Feet-at-LAX-291386471.html
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JoeAltmaier
Irrelevant. Birds etc hit planes all the time. Jet engines are tested by
throwing chickens into them. They have to survive without damage. The
quadcopter hysteria is silly nonsense.

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tzs
That's wrong.

The requirements are that birds in certain weight ranges, at certain stages of
flight, when ingested will not cause an engine fire, will not prevent the
engine from being shut down, and the engine will provide reduced thrust for a
specified amount of time. E.g., one of the requirements is that a strike of a
1.35 kg bird at initial climb speed and takeoff thrust will not cause a
sustained power loss of more than 25%, will not require an engine shutdown
within 5 minutes, and will not result in a hazardous engine condition (e.g.,
fire). Another is that a 1.8 kg to 3.65 kg bird strike at that phase of flight
won't cause fire, uncontained failure, or prevent shutdown and the engine will
provide 50% power for at least 14 minutes, and that these requirements can be
met with no thrust lever movement by the pilots for at least 15 seconds after
the impact.

The engine will generally require extensive, expensive, repair, and the flight
will generally have to declare an emergency so if this happens on or shortly
after takeoff the flight will return to the airport, massively disrupting
travel.

Also, those are the _current_ standards. When an engine is certified, it is
certified to whatever standard is current at the time. When the standards are
later revised, engines already certified do not have to be brought up to the
new standard. That are a lot of engines out there on standards from 20 years
ago.

You can find many YouTube videos from plane watchers and plane passengers
showing birdstrikes resulting in engines shut down and flights making
emergency returns to the airport.

