Are Bird Strikes No Longer “Extraordinary Events”? Judge Rules in Favor of Flyers, Grants Compensation
Joe Cortez April 30, 2015
In light of a recent court ruling, bird strikes may no longer be considered “extraordinary events”.
Bird strikes may no longer be considered an “extraordinary event” under British law after a judge ruled in favor of a passenger whose travels were delayed by an avifauna incident. The Telegraph reports a Manchester County Court ruling considers a bird strike as a delay-causing event, but not one that would fall under the “extraordinary” clause.
The ruling comes from the case of Timothy Ash, who took British charter carrier Thomas Cook to court for denying his claim for delay compensation. Under European Union law, air carriers are obligated to pay claims for flight delays, unless the flight is delayed for an “extraordinary circumstance.” The carrier claimed that the bird strike was an extraordinary circumstance, but a judge in the Manchester County Court disagreed.
“For my part I observe that the word used is ‘extraordinary’ rather than ‘unexpected’, ‘unforeseeable’, ‘unusual’ or even ‘rare’. ‘Extraordinary’, to me, connotes something beyond unusual,” the judge wrote in his ruling, as published by The Telegraph. “Bird strikes happen every day, in fact many times a day, and would hardly be worthy of comment but for the delay which they cause.”
As a result, the judge ordered Thomas Cook to pay out claims of around $475 to Ash and three other passengers in the suit. Attorneys for Ash suggest that the lawsuit could set the tone for future delay claims involving bird strikes.
“The judgement has gone through in Manchester, where a lot of these flight delay cases are heard,” a spokesperson for the law firm representing Ash told The Telegraph. “I would be surprised if other judges here didn’t see this ruling and follow the same logic.”
Currently, bird strikes are covered under British law as an “extraordinary circumstance,” which does not require a delay claim to be paid. Other “extraordinary circumstances” include terrorism, hijacking, weather and human factors. In a statement to the newspaper, Thomas Cook offered an apology, but defended their stance in not paying the original claim as an “extraordinary circumstance.”
[Photo: iStock]
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weero you have hit the nail on the head, if only all the information was public then the whole situation would be easier to understand. I am the person named in the article and have still myself not been given a full explanation from the airline even after going to court!!
This is absurd and probably serves more to weaken the underlying regulation and its application.
It's not absurd, as it's original aim was to stop airlines massively over booking their aircraft and therefore bumping people off their flights. But it is badly written and Airlines should not be penalised for taking a cautious approach to safety.
It's 261, not 264 EMPCAMPBE The Telegraph article is very badly written and no explanation of details is given. As the plane did not divert or land on route, it is unlikely that the delayed happened due to a bird strike on the route in question. It seems that the airline used an earlier birdstrike as a generic excuse for all subsequent delays and that the court would not have tolerated this reasoning. Pure speculation though as all other articles I found obsess about the wording of the verdict and not the case in question. The usual mainstream media crisis on full swing.
Another reason why EU264 is completely absurd. I understand the intent is to make sure that airlines don't try to hose passenger's when there's a problem that's legitimately their fault. But let's face it - travel sometimes involves circumstances where neither the passenger nor the airline is at fault. Stuff happens. Snow, wind, thunderstorms, etc. Ensuring only the airline's have to pay up in these circumstances has unintended consequences. The Iceland Volcano eruption decision is another example of the absurdity of the law. Maybe the judge will wish he ruled differently the next time he buys a ticket and has to pay a mandatory "Bird Strike Compensation Fee" as part of the ticket.