£9bn Thames airport ruled out because of birds hazard

The Government appears to have ruled out building a £9bn airport on the Thames estuary yesterday because of the danger of planes colliding with birds.

Even with "world-class" management of such risks at the proposed site at Cliffe, in Kent, the hazard posed by birds would be higher than at any other British airport, according to a government-commissioned survey.

Unless the problem was carefully managed, an airport "could not operate" on the site, the Transport Secretary, Alistair Darling, told MPs. He said he would consider the conclusions from the report carefully before announcing his decision on the proposal and all other options for airport expansion, in an aviation White Paper later this year.

A plan for a major airport at Cliffe, with up to four runways and 110 million passengers a year, was put forward as a possible option in a consultation paper from the Government in July 2002. Airports have to take all possible measures against "birdstrike" – caused by flocks flying into aircraft engines, sometimes with catastrophic results.

The Cliffe birdstrike report was produced jointly by the Central Science Laboratory, a government agency, and the British Trust for Ornithology, a charitable trust. The Cliffe airport plan has been much opposed by conservationists, local residents and privately by some ministers.

The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds said the study endorsed its warnings that "birds and planes just don't mix".