There are eight to ten birdstrikes each year at Eielson, which is very low
compared to other bases. Most of the strikes occur in the traffic pattern and involve small
birds such as mews, gulls and cliff swallows. Geese have only accounted for a small
percentage of bird strikes.

The low number of bird strikes is a direct result of our bird avoidance program.
Our program limits bird strikes through two methods: habitat management and pilot
awareness.

The most effective method of reducing bird strikes is habitat management. Much
of the bird population that comes to Eielson is the result of regular migrations in the
Spring and Fall. Many birds are attracted to the short grasses and bare areas around the
runway. By managing the vegetation around the airfield, migratory birds will chose
another place to land, an area that won’t affect flying operations.
We do this by letting the grass in the runway infield grow long. Second, bare
areas around the airfield are re-seeded with tall grasses to create a homogenous foliage
environment with high and low spots. And third, base engineers are filling three man-
made water holes that attract birds close to the runway.

The second method of reducing bird strikes is pilot awareness of bird
concentrations. When bird activity becomes high enough to warrant caution, airfield and
safety people declare one of three bird conditions: low, moderate or severe. The
conditions restrict the types of landing approaches and warn pilots of bird activity.
A study of birdstrikes at Eielson over the last four years concludes our pro-active
methods are working. Large migrations of birds pass Eielson from April 15-May 10 and
Aug. 20-Oct. 10. Despite increased bird concentrations during these migrations, there
was no increase in bird strikes. An Air Force bird strike avoidance team rated the Eielson
program “very good” and gave us recommendations that we have aleady implemented to
make it better.

The Eielson bird avoidance program is proven effective. But this does not mean
there is no threat of future airstrikes. Pilots must always be aware of the threat of strikes,
and base safety officials must be ready to look at other methods of bird avoidance. T hese
methods include noise making devices, reflective tape and, as a last resort, lethal bird
At Eielson our primary concern is for the safety and well being of our people, the
community, the environment and our aircraft. Through continued proactive birdstrike
avoidance we will always work to improve safety.

Birds colliding into planes, referred to as ‘bired strikes’, cost the aviation industry up to $3 billion every year. Even worse, they have contributed to a number of fatal plane crashes: 24 people were killed in Alaska in a bird strike crash in 1995, and at least 68 people have died in similar incidents in the United States and Europe since then, according to the International Bird Strike Committee.
At almost every major airport around the world the traditional method of reducing the risk of collision is to cull birds which pose a risk to planes.

But Professor Chris Dickman and his colleague Chin-Liang Beh from the University’s Institute of Wildlife are working with Sydney Airport on a system of ecological controls to minimise the danger.
“Generally there can be between two to a dozen collisions every month at Sydney Airport,” said Professor Dickman. “Most involve small species, but medium sized, heavy bodied birds – crows, magpies those sorts of birds – can be more problematic. The worst case scenario would be a pelican. That would be bad news.”

Unfortunately, the habitat around Sydney Airport is particularly attractive to birds. “It is right on the coast and you have lots of sea birds using those waters,” he said. “There is also a lot of pretty good bushland in the surrounding areas, and there are freshwater wetlands nearby.”

Professor Dickman’s project team is using a holistic approach to control bird numbers. Smaller birds that keep close to the ground are encouraged, food sources are controlled, and grass is grown to a length of 20 centimetres. “Even just netting the banks of the local wetlands stops a lot of species coming in,” he said.

And the approach is working. “Last November, for the first time ever, there were no bird strikes reported,” he said.

The project is now in its second year, and already projections are available to tell researchers when to expect certain species of birds and what to do about it.

“We have been doing predictive modelling and have identified which species come in and when. So then you could make sure the schools of fish are dispersed, garbage cans are locked down, and airport staff advised to be extra vigilant.

“The exciting thing is that we are using ecological principles to their best effect. You often hear about applied ecology, but this is a really good opportunity to show how it can be applied.”
Professor Dickman and his team hope to present their findings overseas.

“We have an international model that is working well. As far as we can tell, there is not much else going on like this in the southern hemisphere. Instead of sending airport workers out to check what birds are around and then shooting them, we are trying to make sure that we take a more considered and proactive approach.”

National Transportation Safety Board officials confirmed initial indications that U.S. Airways flight 1549 struck a flock of birds, which were sucked into the engines and caused them to fail. The pilot, former Air Force pilot Chesley B. “Sully” Sullenberger III, successfully landed the plane in New York’s Hudson River and is credited with saving all 155 people on board.

The incident brought public focus to a problem the Air Force, along with the airline industry, has long struggled to overcome.

Last year alone, the Air Force experienced more than 4,000 bird strikes, Eugene LeBoeuf, chief of the Air Force’s Bird/Wildlife Aircraft Strike Hazard, or BASH, program at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M., told American Forces Press Service.

Fortunately, none of those bird strikes was classified as a “Class A” accident, one that results in a death or more than $1 million in damages, LeBoeuf said. But collectively, they cost the Air Force an estimated $35 million.

Bird strikes are on the rise, he said, and present a serious safety issue. The crash of an E-3B Airborne Warning and Control System plane in 1995 after takeoff from Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska, painfully drove that point home. All 24 crew members died when the plane struck a flock of Canada geese just after takeoff.

“When you have a bird strike, it’s like throwing a rock into the engine,” said Air Force Staff Sgt. Paul White, airfield operations supervisor at Andrews Air Force Base, Md. “It stops the turbine from spinning, and that can be catastrophic.”

The BASH program works to avert accidents like the one at Elmendorf and last week’s incident in New York. Based on a system of “integrated pest management,” it aims to keep air bases, airfields and the air space and ground in and around them free of birds and wildlife that can hamper aircraft operations, LeBoeuf explained.

That’s a challenge, he said, with more Canada geese taking up permanent residence in the United States, a burgeoning snow goose population and a comeback for the pelican population after DDT and other insecticides were banned.

But birds aren’t the only problem, LeBoeuf said. He’s seen it all: deer, coyotes, wild pigs and even alligators finding their way onto Air Force flightlines. “They’re mobile speed bumps, and aircraft don’t take kindly to them,” he said.

Step one in the BASH program is “habitat alteration,” which LeBoeuf defined as making airfields as uninviting as possible. Anything that might serve as a perch is removed, denying birds an elevated place to roost. Potential perches that can’t be removed get spikes driven into them.

Meanwhile, low spots in the land where birds can hide or seek water that collects are filled in.

Dan Vredenburgh, a contractor who oversees Andrews Air Force Base’s BASH program, follows the Air Force protocol of ensuring grass around the airfield is maintained between 7 and 14 inches. That’s too short for ground birds to nest in, but too long for them to feel safe feeding in, he explained.

“These are the benign approaches, but if they don’t work, we turn to more active techniques,” LeBoeuf said. In a word, he defined that as “harassment.”

Vredenburgh, for example, has a whole list of tricks to make Andrews unwelcoming to seagulls, blackbirds, starlings, turkey vultures, cowbirds, ducks and geese that frequent the region.

He fires off pyrotechnics and propane cannons as needed to scare birds from the 4,320-acre base. One of his most effective tools is Bree, a two-tone border collie that chases away birds or other wildlife that might be tempted to take up residence. Vrendenburg and Bree patrol the base regularly, and he sets her loose when he discovers birds roosting.

“When she takes off, they leave in a hurry,” Vrendenburgh said. “After a couple of times, they probably won’t come back.”

Other bases use different techniques. The Royal Air Force base at Mildenhall in England, for example, relies on a Moroccan lanner hawk named Goldie to ward off unwanted birds. At Manas Air Base in Kyrgyzstan, a luger falcon named Mustang helps to keep unwanted birds at bay.

But no preventive measure will keep birds and other wildlife away indefinitely, LeBoeuf said. So as a last resort, BASH officials get the permits required to shoot, trap or otherwise remove them from the area.

At Andrews — home of the 316th Wing as well as the 89th Airlift Wing that flies Air Force One and other aircraft in support of the president, vice president and senior U.S. leaders — these measures are helping to reduce bird strikes.

Andrews reported 20 bird strikes last year, down from 30 in fiscal 2007 and an average of about 34 a year in past years, Vredenburgh said. Nearly all involved small birds, and none inflicted major aircraft damage or forced an emergency landing.

“We understand the importance of what we do, and believe we’re helping reduce the problem through our efforts,” he said.

“There’s no question that the BASH program is making a difference,” LeBoeuf said. “It saves lives and aircraft and allows us to maintain our mission. It’s a very important program.”
Related Sites:
Air Force Safety Center

Keith Mutton, who helps to run the U.S. Air Force’s Bird/Wildlife Aircraft Strike Hazard program at the Royal Air Force base in Mildenhall, England, rewards Goldie, a 9-year-old Moroccan lanner hawk, for helping to rid the base of birds. Goldie can launch from Mutton’s arm at up to 40 mph to chase away and ward off unwanted birds that are safety threats.

Officials credit monitoring grass height around runways with helping to deter birds that prevent a hazard to aircraft operations. Here, mowers at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla., ensure grass around the runway is more than 7 inches high, because birds are less likely to land somewhere if they can’t see each other.

Avian hazard: Lights on antennas and cell towers, such as these on a California ridge, can lure migratory birds, resulting in fatalities. Experts are studying the role of colors and flash rates.

As many as 50 million birds are killed annually in US cell-tower collisions. As more towers go up, builders and researchers eye solutions.

On a pitch-dark night thick with clouds in September 2005, it began raining birds under an 1,100-foot television tower in Madison, Wis.

At the base of the tower the next day, researchers identified 400 birds across 23 species, including five types of golden-winged warblers – a migratory songbird listed as a declining species of “particular concern.”

Chalk up one more sad case of a flock of birds striking a communications tower, a problem since such towers began popping up after World War II. (At least 14,000 birds were killed at another Wisconsin tower in 1965.) Yet hopes of solving the bird-strikes-tower problem are soaring.

“This has been an issue for 50 years,” says Joelle Gehring, a biologist with the Michigan Natural Features Inventory in Lansing. “But in the past year and a half, for the first time, we have industry and conservation groups coming together to resolve it.”

Migrating birds were already under big pressure from loss of habitat and collisions with vehicles, buildings, and power lines. House cats kill huge numbers. At least 4 million and as many as 50 million birds are killed annually in tower collisions, the US Fish and Wildlife Service estimates.

Communication towers are one of the fastest-growing parts of the problem due to the US passion for cellphones and high-definition television. Among about 96,000 towers listed in a federal database, some 22,000 new towers were listed as having gone up in just the past five years.

Last month the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ordered the Federal Communications Commission to provide more citizen input and comply with US environmental laws including the National Environmental Policy Act when approving new towers.

Yet the problem – and one partial solution for bird strikes – is less about the number of towers and more about the way they are illuminated at night, researchers say. All communications towers 200-feet or higher – and all towers near a flight path or airport – must be lighted according to Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) standards in order to warn pilots away, FCC rules mandate.

Such tower lighting is not a problem for birds in clear weather. But on stormy and foggy nights, when clouds are thickest, migrating flocks of birds tend to zero in on tower lights like moths to a flame.

So what is it about tower lights that attracts birds and keeps them circling until they hit either the tower, support wires, each other, or drop exhausted to the ground? That’s what Ms. Gehring set out to find out with her three-year study, which involved switching the types of light bulbs on more than a dozen towers, then tabulating the numbers of dead birds below them.

Today FAA regulations require both steady red lights and flashing red or flashing white ones. What Gehring found: Solid steady red lights were a big problem – creating an aura during cloudy weather that drew in birds.

When solid reds were removed, bird deaths fell 71 percent, according to Gehring’s study, which has been peer-reviewed and accepted for publication later this year by the Journal of Ecological Applications.

Gehring’s lighting discovery is “a major breakthrough,” says Albert Manville, a senior wildlife biologist with US Fish and Wildlife Service in Arlington, Va. But that’s hardly the end of the matter, he and others say.

The critical question now becomes: Would turning off the solid red lamps on communications towers, and switching to flashing lights only, mean that pilots would be less able to see them?

If that turns out to be the case, Dr. Manville concedes, those lamps will surely stay on and birds will remain at risk.

“With demand growing so rapidly for more cellphone communications and more emergency broadcasting, and homeland security seeing explosive growth, we know that the growth is going to proceed,” Manville says. “The question becomes: How can we put these up in the most bird-friendly way?”

That’s what the FAA and FCC now seem set to find out. A spokesman for the FAA says the agency is currently pursuing a new round of testing to determine whether alternate lighting for towers would still be effective in alerting pilots. The FCC, under pressure from the recent appeals-court ruling, is proposing the possibility of altering its lighting scheme for towers and is soliciting public comment.

All of which comes as good news to bird lovers like Darin Schroeder, who directs government relations for the American Bird Conservancy, the Washington-based group whose lawsuit triggered the recent ruling. His group is now partnering with the tower-construction industry and with researchers to examine alternate lighting.

Spokesmen for the Personal Communication Industry Association, the wireless infrastructure association as well as CTIA – the international association for the wireless telecommunications industry – did not return phone calls seeking comment on steps now under way for a tentative working-group agreement on alternate lighting for their towers.

“We know there’s a need for emergency broadcasting and we certainly don’t want to jeopardize human life,” Mr. Schroeder says. “We’re not asking anybody to take down their towers or not build them. We think we can work with industry to save millions of birds from dying unnecessarily and still have a great communications system.”

Whilst Bird Strike Reporting is a reactive response to the potential hazard, there is no alternative widely-available means of monitoring potentially hazardous bird activity and this has been recognised by Regulatory action to improve the extent of reporting. However, whilst the recording of bird strikes is a very important part of understanding both actual and relative risks, it has to be recognised that:

(1) Very few bird strikes out of the total reported are hazardous to continued safe flight

(2) Only a relatively small minority of bird strikes, especially in jurisdictions with a healthy reporting culture, cause damage, although the overall cost of repairing bird strike damage is high and damage to individual aircraft or their engines can be very expensive to repair.

(3) The relationship between the risk of any birdstrike and the risk of one which is hazardous to continued safe flight is unclear and there is no evidence to suggest that it is linear so that hazard severity based upon all-species strike rates, even if moderated by aircraft movements, is unhelpful.

The Requirement to Report Bird Strikes

By the provisions in ICAO Annex 14, Aerodrome Design and Operations, Volume I, bird strikes are required to be reported at national (member State) level. Section 9.4.2 of the same Annex requires that “Bird strike reports shall be collected and forwarded to ICAO for inclusion in the ICAO Birds Strike Information System (IBIS) database”. To facilitate this obligation, States are expected to take appropriate action to collect data from aircraft and airport operators, although the effectiveness of this process varies very widely and geographical bias in the overall data coverage results.

According to JAR–OPS 1 recommendations: “(i) A commander shall immediately inform the local air traffic service unit whenever a potential bird hazard is observed.”, and “(ii) If he is aware that a bird strike has occurred, a commander shall submit a written bird strike report after landing to the Authority whenever an aircraft for which he is responsible suffers a bird strike that results in significant damage to the aircraft or the loss or malfunction of any essential service. If the bird strike is discovered when the commander is not available, the operator is responsible for submitting the report.” [JAR-OPS 1.420(d), (3)]

Description

Since roughly 90% of all strikes with a known location occur on or in the vicinity of an airport, the issue impacts not only on aircraft operators but also on the operational safety of airports. The collection of data on bird strikes is aimed at facilitating the detection of locations where there is a high probability of a significant bird strike hazard and can help to define the nature of the problem. Data on bird strikes (and other wild life strikes) is essential for bird and wildlife management on and around airports. This information is also useful to aircraft fuselage and engine manufacturers, assisting them in the design of bird strike resistant airframe structures and engines. That is why bird strike reports of sufficient quality collected, analysed and finally submitted to ICAO by States are of great value at national, regional and global level.

Care must be exercised while interpreting the data collected. For example, an airport with an increasing rate of bird strikes is not necessarily becoming a more risky location. The straightforward total number of strikes at an airport is not a good indicator of risk, and examination of the data by species struck and the distinguishing of multiple from single strikes is critical. If an increase in recorded strikes is attributable to an increase in incidents caused by encounters with single small birds, whereas the number of strikes involving large bird species and/or flocks of birds is falling, then this may well be indicative of both better bird control and better reporting of strikes.

Actual bird strikes may not provide the whole picture and the recording via routine safety reports of occurrences of potentially hazardous bird activity or near miss events can also be very useful even though this is not included in the formal requirements for bird strike reporting.

It may also be important to examine the relationship between aircraft movements and recorded bird strikes. Thus can be done at by both Airport Operators and Aircraft Operators.

What to Report

One of the reasons why ICAO requires that all bird strikes are reported, whether or not they cause damage to the aircraft and whatever bird/wildlife species was involved, is that experience of the analysis of bird remains collected after strikes by experts has shown that the species reported as involved are frequently incorrect.

Incidents where a bird strike was narrowly avoided, perhaps by flight crew being forced to take evasive action to keep away from birds, or of observed significant bird activity which might have constituted a direct hazard in slightly different circumstances, should be reported on a standard safety reporting form.

The information that is commonly sought in a bird strike report includes:

• General information (flight number or registration, aircraft and engine type

• Location and time, (geographic location or airport/runway used, time, IAS and height (AGL) during the occurrence, light conditions – day , night, twilight)

• Flight parameters – Altitude or height agl; IAS

• Phase of flight (take-off roll, initial climb, climb, cruise, descent, approach, landing roll)

• Part(s) of aircraft struck and (if) damaged (engine number, radome, windshield, landing gear, fuselage, tail, etc)

• Effects on flight (rejected take off, emergency/precautionary landing, engine(s) shut down and other consequent effects)

• Relevant meteorological conditions (visibility, cloud cover, precipitation)

• Species information (exact species or species group if known)

• Number of birds seen and number struck,

• Size of birds – small, medium and large if not identified to species or species group)

• Prior warning of bird activity by RTF/ATIS/NOTAM

• Any other relevant information and remarks regarding the occurrence

Report Forms

Discrepancies in some bird strike report forms used by States still exist and information on bird species involved is often missing. Some forms are detailed and complex to fill with lots of descriptive text. As a general rule the report forms should be relatively short and self explanatory to complete.

States which report data in a significantly different format from that required by IBIS are urged by ICAO to comply with the format of the IBIS reporting form, especially when key data fields are omitted.

Examples of bird strike reporting forms can be found at:

• Bird strike report form used by the German Bird Strike Committee (GBSC) – http://www.davvl.de/VSFormblatt_eng.pdf and,

• Bird strike online report form utilised by the FAA – [http://wildlife.pr.erau.edu/strikeform/birdstrikeform.php].