Bird Strike Committee Proceedings
Date of this Version
October 2002
Abstract
The purpose of the proposed study was to examine the reduction of birdstrikes to aircraft during the Bird Aircraft Strike Hazard (BASH) Phase II flight restriction periods and their affect on Air Mobility Command (AMC) and the U.S. Air Force (USAF). This study sampled the entire population of AMC airfields with BASH Phase II flight restrictions. The test period consisted of damaging birdstrike data collected 5 years before BASH Phase II operations began (1991-1995), and the years during BASH Phase II (1996-2000). It was hypothesized that since the implementation of BASH Phase II flight restrictions, there had been no significant reduction to the number of birdstrikes on AMC aircraft. During the period before BASH Phase II flight restrictions (1991-1995), AMC had a total of 35 reported damaging birdstrikes during the historic Phase II periods. Damaging birdstrikes increased in AMC to 44 from 1996-2000, when Phase II flight restrictions were imposed at these bases. The study concluded that not only was there no significant reduction in damaging birdstrikes, there was actually a 21% increase of damaging birdstrikes, AMC wide. To date, there has been no known test of the USAF BASH Phase II program to determine if it has been successful.