- WARNING – GRAPHIC CONTENT
This is the moment a vulture crashed into a plane’s cockpit, forcing the pilot to perform an emergency landing with the dead bird hanging in front of him.
Footage taken mid-flight on the plane showed the dead bird’s carcass, covered in blood and ruffled feathers, hanging by its feet from the top of the windshield.
The pilot’s hair was buffeted by the wind coming in from a massive gap in the window.
The pilot, who was flying the plane to Eirunepe, in the Brazilian state of Amazonas, on December 5 with five passengers onboard, was seen taxiing on the runway without further incident.
Photos taken after the plane landed showed an enormous hole on the left side of the plane’s windshield.
Blood can be seen spattered across the glass and metal, with one of the vulture’s wings keeping it in place.
Inside the place, large shards of glass can be seen on the dashboard.
The single-engine plane had reportedly taken off from Envira, also in Amazonas.
Footage taken mid-flight on the plane showed the dead bird’s carcass, covered in blood and ruffled feathers, hanging by its feet from the top of the windshield
Photos taken after the plane landed showed an enormous hole on the left side of the plane’s windshield
Miraculously, none of the passengers were hurt during the incident
None of the passengers were injured, with the footage showing the visibly shaken pilot and co-pilot narrating the situation to the other people on board.
The pilot could be heard saying: ‘It was a close call! This is the fault of the landfill next to the airport, which attracts an absurd amount of vultures to the area.’
The birds scavenging from the nearby landfill site represent a constant risk to aircraft approaching the airport, according to local media.
One passenger, who was not named, said: ‘We thought we wouldn’t get out alive. It was a miracle to land with that in the pilot’s face.’
