Bhubaneswar, Sept. 7: The municipal corporation today started demolishing meat and fish shops around Biju Patnaik International Airport to curb bird-hit incidents.

The civic body demolished at least 74 shops selling chicken, meat and fish at Siripur, Baramunda, Khandagiri, Bharatpur, Rental Square, Fire Station and in the Kargil slum areas.

Sources in the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation said the eviction drive was mainly conducted at the southwest zone of the city, the areas encircling the airport.

Following concern shown by the airport environment management committee, the corporation's Swachha Bhubaneswar Abhiyan team, headed by its additional commissioner Sudhansu Mohan Samal, yesterday carried out a survey around the airport. It found several shops selling mutton and fishes around the airport and the remnants of these shops were being dumped in the nearby areas. This provides fodder to the birds that hover in the localities.

"Such drives would be conducted on regular basis to remove all meat shops from the airport vicinity to prevent the threat of bird hit to flight," said Samal.

The airport authorities said there were hardly any reports of bird-hit incidents in the first three months of this year. But, in the past five months, especially during rains, 15 such incidents had been reported.

Earlier, the airport authorities had used laser guns and cracker launchers to control the bird menace. It had also made attempts to create awareness about the issue among residents and traders, apart from chopping of tree branches in the airport area. But, the results were not satisfactory.

In 2012, there had been nine bird-hit cases reported in the airport, while 10 such cases were reported in 2013 and 12 in 2014.

In its attempts to reduce such incidents, the authorities had earlier removed meat shops from Gandamunda, Pokhariput and some other places. In March, it had decided to remove the Sundarpada haat as well.

Besides, the committee informed the state government about the dog menace in and around the airport and its terminal area. It had also advised the civic body to put more garbage bins around the airport and clean those every day, so that birds and animals did not gather nearby.