Channel 2 Investigates

Officials use technology to stop bird strikes at Atlanta's airport

By Justin Gray, WSB-TV
By Justin Gray, WSB-TV
Officials at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport are turning to technology to help prevent bird strikes, which have been an aviation problem for more than a century.
“There are about three dozen bird strikes a day,” said Michael Begier, of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. “It’s a problem we’ve had since the beginning of aviation.”
Steven Boyd is Hartsfield-Jackson’s on-site biologist. His job is to keep birds, deer and other animals from getting too close to planes.

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“You can’t see it unless you’re out there. So just riding around, as simply as it sounds, seeing the things that are going on,” Boyd said.
Boyd and his team use a wide variety of methods to keep the animals away, like a 130-decibel radio operated remote control propane cannon and flair guns.
“The more tools in the toolbox, the better,” Boyd said.
To know what works at the airport, they have to know with what they’re dealing. That’s where Carla Dove and her team at the Smithsonian come in.
“It’s kind of like solving a puzzle,” Dove said.
The pieces to the puzzle are the remains of birds that collide with commercial airplanes, usually on takeoff or landing.
Bird strike can cause major damage and put lives at risk.
It was a bird strike that brought down U.S. Airways flight 1549, the famous “Miracle on the Hudson” in 2009.
The Smithsonian team uses everything from microscopes to DNA to catalog and identify the bird in each and every strike.
Every move biologists at the airport take -- like homemade traps to catch hawks -- are based on what they learn from the team at the Smithsonian.

This page provides preliminary accident and incident information reported to the Office of Accident Investigation & Prevention within the past 10 business days. All information is preliminary and subject to change.

Cox Media Group

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