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This Washington Post article is about a Delta Airlines flight that took off after an initial delay, before turning back again shortly after, because of a bird that managed to stowaway in the cockpit.

My questions,

  1. Would it be dangerous having the bird in the cockpit?

  2. Was the decision to turn back expected or over the top?

  3. Do Delta regulations (or relevant regulations) actually cover something this specific, or would it have been under some catch-all? If so, what would that be?

  4. Have there been any similar incidents?

  5. Does this ever happen on small private aircraft? (It's not unheard of to find a small bird sitting in your car for some reason - maybe it's the same?) Has it ever happened to anyone here, what's the outcome?

and mostly,

  1. Why didn't they just kill it?

(Aircraft kill small birds by the thousands, I mean - chicken was probably served on board.)

Farhan
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Fattie
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    There was a case of a stowaway cat on an ultralight airplane: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_8mdH20qTQ – abelenky Jan 02 '18 at 17:13
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    I once found a mountain bluebird in my Cherokee, when I left it parked with the vent window open. Got it out before taking off, though. More common is birds nesting in the engine... – jamesqf Jan 02 '18 at 18:33
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    Another way to ask the first question is "is it as dangerous thing having a tiny dinosaur in the cockpit?" The answers kinda flow from there. – Rich Jan 02 '18 at 18:58
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    You should include a small summary of the story you linked. – Manu H Jan 02 '18 at 18:58
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    If this was an international flight then there could have been issues with undocumented livestock movements. Even between states, it could transfer pathogens to an area that was previously clear. This is a high priority for an island nation. – Criggie Jan 02 '18 at 19:51
  • SE has linked this question to https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/14759/does-sex-occur-in-aircraft-cockpits-and-is-this-safe and from the title, I wondered if it was the same subject. – Criggie Jan 02 '18 at 19:52
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    The flight was from Detroit to Atlanta (domestic flight, 2 hours) for people curious about international ramifications. – JPhi1618 Jan 02 '18 at 19:57
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    The probability of birdstrike is infinitely more when THE BIRD IS INSIDE THE PLANE! – canadianer Jan 02 '18 at 21:14
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    There's also the possibility that the bird knows more about flying than the pilots do. – Harper - Reinstate Monica Jan 02 '18 at 23:47
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    There were good edits that removed the clickbaity title and clarified events. Why revert them to to a poor title and a less informative body? – Nij Jan 03 '18 at 00:30
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    @abelenky That video really makes you wonder what kind of preflight checks that pilot did. If any. Did he check to make sure that the wings were still attached, for example? – user Jan 03 '18 at 13:13
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    @Fattie I rolled back your question because it was in a better state than the most recent edit. – Farhan Jan 03 '18 at 14:08
  • @MichaelKjörling Cats can move--perhaps it avoided him while he was doing the preflight. Or he could have preflighted, then gotten his passenger--and the cat got in during that time. – Loren Pechtel Jan 04 '18 at 01:14
  • @LorenPechtel True, especially that the cat may have avoided him, but if I saw something moving on an aircraft, even just out of the corner of one eye, during the preflight, I'd darn well look more closely before dismissing it. So the cat would have had to really avoid the pilot in that case; and it didn't seem particularly inclined to avoid being seen after takeoff... Either way we can guess all day and not come any closer to an explanation for what really happened, but I do sincerely (for everyone involved) hope the pilot learned a lesson from the incident! – user Jan 04 '18 at 12:37
  • Re "and mostly, -- Why didn't they just kill it?" -- Please elaborate to add details. Do you mean, like, using the sawed-off shotgun that most pilots habitually carry on long flights? Or using some other means? Or-- ??? PS -- "Aircraft kill small birds by the thousands" -- gets my vote for most irrelevant comment ever attached to any ASE question or answer. Do we award some sort of prize for that? – quiet flyer Apr 23 '23 at 16:05
  • Quiet, if you've ever had to catch say a pet small bird in a room, it's pretty easy, they usually just tuck up to one corner or nook. Then you "take it in your hand". (Sure, if a bird's flying around in a basketball arena or such, one can't catch it.) As others have pointed out, you don't want the copilot (or whoever) wiggling around trying to grab a bird in a cockpit while you're flying along. However it's unclear in the stories if birdie was there while they were sitting on the ground; it would be trivial to grab it while still at the gate. – Fattie Apr 24 '23 at 11:10
  • Regarding your second comment section, there was an implication in some stories that one wouldn't want to kill a small bird, that there was an animal welfare issue. IMO that would be absurdist. That being said, you can see it being a "PR nightmare" new story, "pilot squishes sparrow like spider..." (I'm not sure what you mean by "Do we ..."; as far as I know you and I (we? some other grouping?) neither operate this site nor give awards.) (If you are one of the site operators, fair enough.) (If your sentence was some sort of joke - cheers.) – Fattie Apr 24 '23 at 11:15
  • (Funnily enough our pet budgie recently passed on to a better place, RIP. This QA being regurgitated gives me a tear!) – Fattie Apr 24 '23 at 11:18

3 Answers3

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Having a small bird in a cockpit, or anywhere on board, would not be a problem during a normal flight because a normal flight should have a wide safety margin.

However, a situation can change extremely rapidly from safe-and-normal to heavy workload to full-emergency due to any number of factors, including weather, mechanical issues, airspace/congestion, etc. In a high stress situation, a small bird could be the proverbial tipping point. So I see and understand the decision to turn back.

It is remotely possible that a small bird could get somewhere it shouldn't, like behind a panel or near electrical lines and cause a short or other serious problem. Its not terribly likely, but with 100+ lives at stake, why would you risk it?

As for why they didn't just kill it: Killing it involves catching it, and catching a small bird while still flying a plane is not easy!!

abelenky
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    Ah, you mean like the "chain..." that leads to a disaster. Fascinating insight... – Fattie Jan 02 '18 at 15:30
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    "Killing it involves catching it, and catching a small bird while still flying a plane is not easy!!" ...and one thing you certainly don't want to do in a cockpit in flight is start flailing around trying to catch a bird which is now doing its very best to avoid you, all the while everything is moving at 700-800 km/h... – user Jan 02 '18 at 17:00
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    Yeah, kill it how? With the shotgun you have under your seat? – Don Branson Jan 02 '18 at 17:38
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    @DonBranson Killing a small bird once you've caught it probably isn't that difficult. Catching said bird, on the other hand... – user Jan 02 '18 at 18:15
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    @MichaelKjörling - indeed. Also, remember to wash the salmonella off your hands once it's dead. – Don Branson Jan 02 '18 at 18:16
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    Note that the USA has not had a commercial aviation death in the last 8 years. You don't get that kind of record by taking unnecessary chances. – T.E.D. Jan 03 '18 at 14:46
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    Besides, that damn chirping could drive one to distraction. I am certain that Bob Hoover could have solved the problem by turning the aircraft upside down (deadstick) quickly enough to knock the creature out and then complete the roll with the bird landing into the glass that he always seems to keep on the panel. Then release the bird on landing. – copper.hat Jan 03 '18 at 20:34
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If it's a small bird bedded down quietly under the jumpseat, I don't think I'd worry about it too much. Presuming that you found out about it while up at altitude, the question is, are you safer cruising for XX minutes to get to your destination, descend, and land, or are you safer cruising for a shorter time while you return to your departure airport, descend, and land? Either way, the bird is in the cockpit for a descent and landing somewhere, and if it seems to be quiet & unobtrusive, I don't see significant risk in the extra time at cruise.

On the other hand, if the bird is wildly flapping around & being an annoyance & a distraction, then minimizing the time that you're putting up with that would absolutely be worthwhile. Even small birds have enough beak & claws to scratch skin, and I wouldn't trust a scratch from any bird not to become a nasty infection.

I think something like this falls entirely within the realm of captain's best judgement -- I've never seen any written guidance at anything approaching the level of "consideration for a bird in the cockpit (discovered after takeoff)".

I'm also drawing a blank for anything similar in recent history, although I suspect that somebody somewhere has probably seen something pretty close. When the major U.S. airlines log multiple millions of flights each year, even the really rare cases tend to come up now & then.

As for "just kill the bird," I suspect that the hard part of that plan would be in the execution of it (the plan, and the bird too, I guess). If it's a fly buzzing around the cockpit, a good smack with the paper copy of the dispatch release will do the job, but for even a small bird, it will take more than that -- which tends to have its share of risks when wielding small improvised weapons in a confined space full of glass screens & instruments, circuit breaker panels, and another pilot whom you'd really like to avoid injuring!

It would be tempting to try to shoo the bird out of the cockpit -- either into the passenger cabin (which has its own concerns -- how long do you leave the door open waiting for the bird to fly out), or opening a cockpit window (at low altitude -- you can open them with sufficiently low pressure differential) & getting it out that way. Of course, in an MD-90, you might have just given yourself a bird strike in an engine that way, so maybe just landing to deplane the fowl passenger would be the better option!

Ralph J
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  • A great answer, thanks! – Fattie Jan 02 '18 at 17:17
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    They were still climbing out when they found the bird. It was only abt 20 min from takeoff to landing. If they'd found it half way through the flight (as some passengers were falsely claiming) then I could see continuing on. – TomMcW Jan 02 '18 at 18:40
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    Nothing in the QRH then? – Martin James Jan 02 '18 at 21:16
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    @MartinJames No, not in the one my airline uses. Nor in the generic Boeing QRH either. – Ralph J Jan 02 '18 at 21:55
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    Defowl the plane. – dotancohen Jan 03 '18 at 08:06
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    I disagree with the first paragraph of your answer. Even if it's sitting somewhere quiet and unobtrusive, it could get up and start being annoying - and there's been a study which won an ig-nobelprize for noting that the longer an animal has been sitting down, the more likely it is to get up sometime soon. While not per se dangerous in a normal situation, if some other abnormal situation comes up (turbulence, technical failure, etc), ANY distraction can be a serious safety hazard. – Lolgast Jan 03 '18 at 08:19
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    @TomMcW Technically, if the flight (from takeoff to landing) only lasted about 20 minutes, there's a pretty big chunk of that which certainly could qualify as "half way through the flight" for the purposes of bird detection. Even with an error of just a few minutes on the part of a passenger's estimate, we're now talking (for, say, ±3 minutes error) between 7 and 13 minutes into the flight; six minutes out of a 20 minute flight being a good 30% of the flight time. – user Jan 03 '18 at 10:35
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    I'm inclined to agree with @Lolgast. Also, more importantly in this case, situations that result in high pilot workload (even something relatively mundane as a bit of turbulence) appears likely to be the exact kind of situations that would upset even an otherwise calm bird, thus risking to immediately greatly increase pilot workload at an already somewhat bad time. I probably wouldn't trust it unless it can recite the safety briefing and is wearing its seatbelt correctly. – user Jan 03 '18 at 10:37
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    "It would be tempting to try to shoo the bird out of the cockpit -- either into the passenger cabin (which has its own concerns -- how long do you leave the door open waiting for the bird to fly out)" Someone, somewhere, just came up with a new terrorist plot for their next movie... – user Jan 03 '18 at 10:38
  • @MichaelKjörling I guess I said that wrong. The article said the passengers claimed they were "half way to Georgia" when the bird reappeared, when in fact they were only airborne like 5 minutes. – TomMcW Jan 03 '18 at 20:18
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    Even the birds are desperate to get out of Detroit! – TomMcW Jan 03 '18 at 20:18
  • @TomMcW Certainly fair enough then. – user Jan 04 '18 at 12:42
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Don't forget the fact that if they were flying to another country (or maybe the bird originated from another country) there could be issues of Bird Flu spreading around. Killing it would be very unhygienic and could spread disease etc through the air con system. Also the crew could become ill if the bird dropped its guts all over the place. Turning back to the airport would be a judgement call but most pilots would definately do it. When the workload is high the bird would also be a huge distraction and finally, if there was an incident the question would be asked "So you had a bird flying around the flight deck...why did you not RTB?"

maru
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