Jane:
>I hope not everyone (but me) has heard this one

Well, it's an oldie but goldie...

When I first heard of chicken-shooting, supposedly they were shot
at jet airplane engines - bird-sucking can break fan blades, etc,
and engines used for airliners have to be certified as being able
to withstand strikes of certain weight without any worse than the
engine being demolished happening (containment of the blade). This
is important - you may recall that a passenger was recently killed
on a DC-9 when a fan blade entered the passenger compartment and
messed the person up in a terminal fashion...

The joke as you cite it has come past me about twice in the last
year - the power of the internet, and all that...

- Don Baccus, Portland OR <donb at rational.com>
Nature photos, on-line guides, at http://www.xxxpdx.com/~dhogaza