Hi guys,
The Rooster Booster is (or was in the mid-80s) at the Arnold Engineering facility in Huntsville, AL. I went on a tour there when I was in college. They showed us a film showing tests of canopies and engines. The turbine engines that failed the test failed pretty spectacularly! They'd fire a frozen chicken wrapped in a plastic bag. The guide told us they had to do it that way or only bones would reach the target.
The most impressive film was a test of an F-16 canopy. The camera was stationed in front of the test cockpit, looking back. They had a pilot dummy in the seat, wearing a helmet. The chicken hit the canopy, which dented in far enough to hit the pilot's helmet. The impact was so severe that the pilot's helmet deformed into an egg shape, then snapped back (this was all in slow-motion). The helmet deformed several times as the shock wave dissipated. Kind of like ringing a bell. There was no apparent damage to the canopy or the helmet, but they said the pilots brains would have been turned to jelly!
About 15 years later, I was very thankful they do this kind of testing when we took a fairly large bird in the windscreen right in front of my nose at 250 knots. Shattered the outer layer of glass, and scared the daylights out of me!
Cheers!
Ben (relurking)