BASH lowers Eglin aircraft incidents nearly 75 percent

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Ryan Hansen
  • Air Armament Center Public Affairs
EGLIN AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. (AFPN) --  While most Air Force bases around the world have a Bird and Wildlife Aircraft Strike Hazard, or BASH, program, Eglin AFB officials have refocused and enhanced their efforts to more effectively deal with the diverse and rather large wildlife population.

Eglin's wildlife strikes dropped by almost 75 percent over the past year because of improvements to the BASH program.

The significance is tied to Bird Strike Committee USA statistics that indicate bird and other wildlife strikes to aircraft causes more than $600 million in damage annually. In addition, more than 195 people have lost their lives to these strikes since 1988.

A little more than a year ago, Marty Daniel and Charles Kara, two U.S. Department of Agriculture wildlife biologists, joined the flight safety office here and started a comprehensive wildlife assessment. This survey has been a key in Eglin AFB's effort to curb bird strikes.

"The way we try to be proactive is we attack the source of the problem," Mr. Daniel said. "Instead of just going out and scaring the birds off the runway, we try to figure out why they're here in the first place."

While their survey is exhaustive, some of the changes they are implementing are easy to put in place and are turning out to be very effective. One change was to simply keep the grass located around the flightline mown to around 10 to 12 inches in height versus 4 to 6 inches.

"Grass management is one easy management tool we came up with because we can manipulate the grass by either not mowing it, or mowing it to a certain height," Mr. Daniel said.

"Flocking birds like to be able to see each other when they land," Mr. Kara said. "So if they go in there and can't see each other, they won't stay around."

The team has also focused their efforts on filling in bare spots on the ground around the flight line as well as eliminating weeds and planting new grasses that do not attract birds.

"Bare spots attract birds too," Mr. Daniel said. "With a bare spot right next to a food source, that's an attraction for them, so we're working to eliminate those bare ground situations."

"We're also going to work to carefully apply some herbicides in certain areas to reduce the amount of weeds," Mr. Kara said. "(Weeds) are what really attract insects, and the insects attract birds."

During their assessment they also noticed a few small ponds around the flight line. This was due to an active beaver population creating dams.

"I know you don't really think about beavers and BASH, but they were impounding some water around the flight line and water attracts birds," Mr. Daniel said. "So in order to get rid of the water, we have to get rid of the beavers."

The office continues to conduct surveys three times per week at different times of the day to monitor the constantly changing wildlife habitat around Eglin AFB. There are 18 different survey sights around the airfield where they record what species are in that particular area.

"We use a software program that helps us monitor and watch for trends," Mr. Kara said. "It uses temperature, humidity level and wind -- really anything that accounts for those critters being there. Those trends will show us what we need to do to go in and mitigate the problem."

The flight safety office also frequently calls upon other offices around Eglin to help push the BASH program over the top. They've used the expertise of personnel from airfield management, civil engineering as well as environmentalists at Jackson Guard.

"(Our) goal is to provide technical and field support to the BASH program for the continued successful management of bird and wildlife species that threaten military and civilian aircraft," said Dennis Teague, an endangered species biologist with the 96th Civil Engineer Group at Jackson Guard.

The flight safety office also plays a role in the base's Bird Hazard Working Group. This team is a cooperative effort where different agencies around Eglin AFB come together to discuss items that can be done to lower the threat.

The bottom line through all of the programs is improved safety for military and civilian aircraft flying in and out of the Eglin AFB air space.

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