Bird Strike Committee Proceedings

 

Date of this Version

8-2008

Comments

Abstract of poster presentation at Bird Strike Committee USA/Canada Meeting, Lake Mary and Sanford, Florida, August 18–21, 2008.

Abstract

The problem of collisions of aircraft, especially military jets, with birds in Poland was neglected by years in spite of some serious incidences with casualties. Moreover, the number of methods that were used to reduce such crashes, still seems inadequate. We started the first project in Poland devoted to study on bird strikes on military airfields. The main goal of this project is to work out any possible methods to prevent aircraft, in the aspect of threats, concerning the safety of flights, from all kinds of birds, those which have breeding-grounds and those which migrate trough the area of military airfield in Deblin. This airfield has been chosen to carry out such researches because it is located close to the valley of the Vistula river, one of the most important pathways of birds’ migration through Poland. The authors presented the dynamics of the bird community structure on the airfield area. Factors which were impacted on bird distributions and “hot spots” in the contexts of bird strikes were discussed. The study presented the importance of internal (carnivore, perch availability, food resources and foraging places) and external factors (dumps, breeding colonies, migration dynamics) on distributions of birds on the airfield. Possible methods of the reduction of bird strikes in condition of military airfield in Deblin based on ornithological knowledge were discussed. Experiences from the former cases of bird strikes from the area of military airfield were reconsidered. The authors of this project suggested applications that the verification of the proposed hypothesis will give real algorithm, which will meaningfully increase already existing prophylaxis of the safety of the airfields against potential birds strike to aircraft and will have positive influence on the safety of the flights.

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