Commercial Pilot Talks About The Danger Of Birds To Airplanes

There has been much speculation surrounding the cause of the plane crash in the Hudson River yesterday, the most prominent one being that a flock of geese caused the aircraft's engines to fail.

Aviation expert, attorney, and commercial pilot Brian Alexander reveals that birds pose a problem to airplanes more often than what one might assume. According to him, between seven to ten thousand bird strikes occur each year, leading to plane damages. Alexander points out that New York sites such as LaGuardia and Kennedy Airports have issues with "bird ingestion" due to their location near landfills and water.

Alexander lauded Flight 1549 pilot Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger for the calm and collected way in which he handled the situation. According to Alexander, it was the pilot's cool-headedness and safety-consciousness that made him "tailor-made" to handle the dilemma before him. He emphasized that we could not have prepared for what happened, and that it was "a once-in-a-lifetime thing."

Alexander hopes that we will learn from this unfortunate incident by focusing on improving our technology, although he allows that "we can't make engines fail-safe."

WATCH THE INTERVIEW AFTER THE JUMP...