Dear Pilot: Should I be afraid of bird strikes?

Yesterday’s dramatic crash landing of a U.S. Airways jetliner into New York’s Hudson River, and the equally dramatic rescue, had many people glued to their television screens. Fortunately, no one aboard the plane was killed. But the news that a flock of geese may have caused the crash has a lot of people wondering just how worried they should be about so-called ?bird strikes.? For that answer we turn to Patrick Smith, pilot and author of Salon.com’s Ask the Pilot.