Langley Officials Fight to Keep F-22s from Being Damaged

LANGLEY AIR FORCE BASE, Va: The Air Force's newest and most technologically advanced fighter, the F-22 Raptor, is under attack here.

Free-falling clams dropped by in-flight birds are regular air threats to the F-22 as gulls drop fist-sized mollusks on the Langley Air Force Base runway to break open the shell-fish appetizer.

The birds' shelling device just happens to be a convenient launch pad for the F-22. Although the gulls remove half their mess -- slurping up tender meat from the runway -- they leave behind hard, brittle sea shells for an F-22 to suck up through its engine intake that can cause severe damage.

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