Birds spell bad luck for Armenian planes — and vice-versa

Birds spell bad luck for Armenian planes — and vice-versa

Agence France Presse — English
March 23, 2005 Wednesday 3:40 PM GMT

YEREVAN March 23 — Birds that had come down out of the trees around
Armenia’s main airport due to heavy snow put no less than three of
the national airline’s planes out of action in a single day when they
were sucked into engines, the Armavia company said on Wednesday.

The unusual series of glitches on Tuesday delayed several flights
out of the capital Yerevan Wednesday.

“Birds were sucked into the turbines of three of our company’s
airplanes that had landed yesterday and last night at Zvartnots
airport,” said Garik Siroian, a company spokesman.

“Because of heavy snowfall (the birds) were not sitting in the trees
and preferred to stroll on the runway,” he explained.

Four planes were undergoing technical checkups to evaluate the damage
caused by the birds. One flight to Moscow and another one to Dubai
have been delayed so far.

Birds that are sucked into jet engines frequently cause problems for
planes taking off and landing at airports around the world, but such
a string of incidents on the same day is unusual.