Airplanes colliding more often with hares at Ukrainian airports
Passenger plane pilots in July 2018 reported three times about collisions with hares at Ukrainian airports, while there was only one report of such an encounter during the first six months of the year, Ukraine's National Bureau for Air Accidents Investigation (NBAAI) has reported.
According to the bureau's July bulletin, late in the evening on July 12 two planes – a Bombardier DH-8D from Poland's LOT in Lviv and a CRJ-9 plane from Austrian Airlines in Odesa – collided with hares during landing.
Bodies of dead hares were found at both landing strips, but the planes and their engines were not damaged.
A similar incident was reported by a Ukraine International Airlines pilot on July 27 after landing in Odesa, although no evidence the plane collided with hares was found.
According to the bureau, it is much more common for airplanes to collide with birds, of which there are many in Ukraine during migration in summer. From 2013 through the first six months of 2018 there were 133 reports of collisions with birds, including 28 in July, 24 in June, 18 in May and September each, and 12 in August. NBAAI said about 44% of the collisions involve the engines, and a third result in damage.
NBAAI analyzed the number of collisions per 1 million plane passengers during the first six months of 2018. Lviv airport tops the rating with 4.6 incidents, it is followed by Kharkiv airport with 2.3.