Jet Engine Design and FOD
Modern jet engines suffer major damage due to even small birds being sucked into the engine. The FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) requires that all engine types pass a test which includes firing a fresh chicken (dead, but not frozen) into a running jet engine from a small cannon. The engine does not have to remain functional after the test, but it must not cause significant damage to the rest of the aircraft. Thus, if the bird strike causes it to "throw a blade" (break apart in a way where parts fly off at high speed), doing so must not cause loss of the aircraft. A chicken gun is used to perform experiments on bird strikes.
Read more about this topic: Foreign Object Damage
Famous quotes containing the words jet, engine and/or design:
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—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“There is a small steam engine in his brain which not only sets the cerebral mass in motion, but keeps the owner in hot water.”
—Unknown. New York Weekly Mirror (July 5, 1845)
“With wonderful art he grinds into paint for his picture all his moods and experiences, so that all his forces may be brought to the encounter. Apparently writing without a particular design or responsibility, setting down his soliloquies from time to time, taking advantage of all his humors, when at length the hour comes to declare himself, he puts down in plain English, without quotation marks, what he, Thomas Carlyle, is ready to defend in the face of the world.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)