Living on an island with seagulls, vultures and lots of smaller migratory birds in spring, it’s a clear risk. But I guess there are a few things we can do to mitigate it:
1) In areas where lots of birds can be suspected, slow down. Gives you and the bird time to react. And, as we all know, the kinetic energy of an impact it so much less at lower speeds.
2) From what I’ve read here and there, “wig-wag” landing lights do seem to help.
3) A chute is definitively an advantage.
And look outside as much as possible of course which is not always easy when you have some nice avionics to look at and play with..
It could be a problem as, if I remember good, only spar is metal on a dr400, but all the rest is fabric and wood and would not resist a 6kg bird at 180km/h.
There are number of image of wing impacted by birds on Google, most are heavily bent as should metal do. Problem with wood is that it doesn’t really bent past the elastic limit.
There are tons of birds around Cannes airport, we are more or less used to that, which is a problem. It’s not unusual to see “gabians” higher than 1000ft, but my biggest fear was a pair of eagles around 6000ft, right in the plane’s routenover the alps, I had to break right to avoid. The most difficult is to understand that it is birds, and they are coming very close when you understand that.
The spars of robins are a kind of wood box :
https://www.robin-aircraft.com/2016/09/saga-robin-episode-2-fabrication-de-laile-du-dr401/
My club is repairing one and I contribute to the grinding 
greg_mp wrote:
if I remember good, only spar is metal on a dr400
Pretty sure the spar is wood… I seem to recall there was a bit of a to do several years ago after an inflight break up (where there was previous aeros claims muddying the waters) which resulted in DGAC inspection/test recommendations which would actually damage it further?
Regards, SD..
There was a Robin that broke up in the UK after a landing mishap – the pilot tagged the wingtip on a hay bale during the landing roll. No damage was apparent to the outside of the wing, so after the pilot dropped off his passengers he took off again thinking everything was OK. However, it’s quite well known that wood spars (especially the aft spar) can suffer a compression fracture with relatively little force applied to the wingtip. This is indeed what happened and shortly after takeoff he lost a wing.
I think I remember that too, but No, Im thinking about a Robin break up in France, I think it was South/East of Paris? I remember the controversy amongst French aeroclubs.
There was a problem regarding the glue used on the spar for a short period. This caused many flying clubs to investigate further to find out which numbers and dates this particular glue was used on. If their aircraft were within that range they had their spars reglued.
@gallois, that was it I think, I distinctly remember having the discussion in bureau meeting…
Metal spars can also suffer a surprising amount of damage from a wingtip shock, due to the lever.
" Even if it did not compromise the internal structure, the asymetry in lift and drag would be a huge problem even without considering further damage which could be caused by the airflow ripping the skin off the damaged part of the wing."
A UK Jodel had ~40 year old cotton tear in flight, opening a wing bay. It was landed without a problem.
From the pax seat, I’ve watched a Great Skua, (gull size) intercept our Jodel, apparently to grab the feathers behind the cockpit. It lost control when in the propwash, and just missed the empennage.
Hitting the tail could be much more serious than the wing.
The DR wooden box spar is strong. I hit a fencepost at near flying speed and the spar was not damaged.
