Amendment to safety rules says that airport and airline operators need to report not just bird strikes, but also incidents of a plane hitting an animal while on runway
Amendment to safety rules says that airport and airline operators need to report not just bird strikes, but also incidents of a plane hitting an animal while on runwayu00a0
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Not just the avian, but creatures terrestrial have also been bound by air-safety regulations now. A new amendment in the air-safety procedure stipulates that a dog hit should also be reported to the authorities by the airport and the airline operators. The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has replaced the old Bird Strike Form with Wildlife Strike Form to make the reporting process more inclusive.
The changed format has to be compulsorily adopted by airlines and airports from December 10. It covers animals and birds like pariah kite, crow, deer, dog and pigeon.
The DGCA circular (F No AV 15023/02/2011-AS, copy with MiD DAY) dated October 4 issued by Deputy Director General, DGCA, Lalit Gupta to all the airlines and airports states, "The existing bird strike incident report form has been revised by the DGCA to include wildlife, covering strikes by birds and animals, reporting of financial loss and standardisation of reporting format so as to bring uniformity in reporting of wildlife (bird/animal) strikes."
The circular further reads, "This amendment has introduced new provisions including replacing 'bird strike' with 'wildlife strike' to cover strikes both by birds and other animals. Accordingly, based on discussions with airlines
and airport operators, the existing Bird Strike Incident Reporting Form has been revised by DGCA to make the reporting procedure more effective and elaborate."
Rulebook According to the new circular, aircraft maintenance personnel should identify aircraft damage and report it as having been caused by wildlife strike, if the remains of the creature suspected hit are found within 200 ft
of the runway centerline, unless another cause of death is identified. Wildlife presence on the airport has a significant impact on the flight such as aborted take-off, high-speed to emergency stop, aircraft leaving the pavement area to avoid collision with the animal, a complete turn-around.
The duly filled-in Wildlife Strike Form shall be forwarded to the Regional Air Safety offices with a copy to
Director, Air Safety, DGCA and concerned airport operator within two days of the incident.
All airport and airlines operators shall prepare monthly data and furnish the report to the Regional Air Safety Offices by the 7th of every month.u00a0
