Birds and Lieutenants scare me more than anything in the air...

I second Jim's words -- seems the MOAs and Restricted Areas have an
abundance of turkey buzzards and re-tailed hawks -- lethal-sized creatures
when they get in your way at high Q.

I've run into four birds in the course of my career, 3 daytime, 1 at night
(at 1500'AGL). Fortunately, they were the smaller varieties -- 2 starlings,
2 undetermined. One of the starlings punched a neat hole the size of my
fist in the leading edge of the intake, went through a couple vertical frame
members and lodged next to a fuel cell. Never knew anything happened 'til a
PC found it post flight in the fuel pits...Class C damage at the time.



"Jim Carriere" wrote in message
...
"Kristan Roberge" wrote in message
...
How often do you strike 4 pounds of bird? Other than ducks and geese, I
can't
think of many 4 pound birds you might run a plane into.

Um, there's lots... I've dodged plenty of hawks and buzzards- big ones
over
5 foot wingspan too. It depends what area you fly in I guess.

Buzzards aren't God's smartest creatures either, they don't seem to yield
to
anything no matter how big it is. (Even seagulls will give you right of
way
if they see you in time.)