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This massive cannon fires dead chickens at high speed in the name of airplane safety

2021-12-10 00:00:00

Birds and airplanes collide more than 10,000 times each year, according to reports to the Federal Aviation Administration. In fact, it was a flock of geese that caused the emergency forced water landing of US Airways Flight 1549 in 2009, aka "the miracle on the Hudson." While bird strikes rarely cause catastrophic accidents, it does happen and the airline industry has struggled with the risk for decades. To better test commercial planes and engines' resilience against bird strikes, Canada's Aerospace Research Centre worked with military and industry collaborators to build a bird cannon that fires dead chickens at airplanes on the ground in test situations.

The first chicken cannon was deployed in 1968 and they've been finessing the design ever since. The largest machine in the arsenal is the Super Cannon with a 17.25 inch barrel. From CNN:
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