A chicken gun or flight impact simulator is a large-diameter, compressed-air gun used to fire bird carcasses at aircraft components in order to simulate high-speed bird strikes during the aircraft's flight. Jet engines and aircraft windshields are particularly vulnerable to damage from such strikes, and are the most common target in such tests. Although various species of bird are used in aircraft testing and certification, the device acquired the common name of "chicken gun" as chickens are the most commonly used 'ammunition' owing to their ready availability. Context Bird strikes are a significant hazard to flight safety, particularly around takeoff and landing where crew workload is highest and there is scant time for recovery before a potential impact with the ground. The speeds involved in a collision between a jet aircraft and a bird can be considerable – often around – resulting in a large transfer of kinetic energy. A bird colliding with an aircraft windshield could penetrate or shatter it, injuring the flight crew or impairing their ability to see. At high altitudes such an event could cause uncontrolled decompression. A bird ingested by a jet engine can break the engine's compressor blades, potentially causing catastrophic damage. Multiple measures are used to prevent bird strikes, such as the use of deterrent systems at airports to prevent birds from gathering, population control using birds of prey or firearms, and recently avian radar systems that track flocks of birds and give warnings to pilots and air traffic controllers. Despite this, the risk of bird strikes is impossible to eliminate and therefore most government certification authorities such as the US Federal Aviation Administration and the European Aviation Safety Agency require that aircraft engines and airframes be resilient against bird strikes to a certain degree as part of the airworthiness certification process. In general, an engine should not suffer an uncontained failure (an event where rotating parts are ejected from the engine casing) after impact with a suitably-sized bird, and a bird strike to the airframe of a craft should not prevent "continued safe flight [and a] normal landing". History The first recorded chicken gun was built in 1942 by the US Civil Aeronautics Administration in collaboration with the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company. Built at Westinghouse's High Power Laboratory in Pittsburgh, it was capable of firing bird carcasses at up to , although most tests were conducted with muzzle velocities around .