Delta flight makes emergency landing

A Delta Connection flight bound for Mobile, Ala., landed safely Thursday night after hitting birds following takeoff from Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, an airline spokeswoman said.

Flight 5221, a CRJ-200 regional jet with 50 passengers and three crew members, took off shortly after 9:30 p.m., said Atlantic Southeast Airlines spokeswoman Allison Baker. ASA is one of Delta’s regional contract carriers and operated the flight.

“After takeoff, on the climb, there was a bird strike,” Baker said.

The plane circled over northwest Georgia before returning to Atlanta and landing “normally” shortly after 11 p.m., Baker said.

“Our pilots are well-trained to respond to those types of situations, and they reported it and returned back to Atlanta safely,” Baker said.

The passengers were taken to local hotels, and were to be re-booked on other flights on Friday.

Baker did not know the extent of damage to the plane, but she said it never lost engine power during the incident.

Passenger Sarah Burch, whose husband is an executive producer at Mobile television station WKRG, told the station that she saw visible damage to the nose and right wing of the plane. The station reported that passengers heard a loud thud, and that the pilot said the plane had hit two geese.

Two months ago, the pilots of a US Airways Airbus 320 bound for Charlotte, N.C., were forced to ditch the plane in the Hudson River when it ingested Canada geese into both engines shortly after taking off from New York’s LaGuardia Airport. The engines lost all thrust. All 155 passengers and crew members survived.

In February, 1973, seven people were killed when a LearJet taking off from DeKalb-Peachtree Airport lost power after striking a flock of cowbirds that were attracted to a nearby trash-transfer station.

Many airports including Hartsfield-Jackson take steps to minimize birds’ presence in the area, such as firing air cannons to scare off flocks.

ASA is owned by Utah-based Skywest but is based in Atlanta and works exclusively in partnership with Delta.