Estimated read time: 3-4 minutes
- The Salt Lake City Airport's wildlife team manages animal hazards at the airport.
- The team uses habitat modification, hazing and relocation effort to prevent animal-aircraft conflicts.
- The migration season raises concerns about birds at the airport.
SALT LAKE CITY — While flights are taking off at the Salt Lake City International Airport, employees like Ron Smith are busy keeping his eyes not on the planes, but on animals.
"I've been in aviation for over 20 years. I was doing fuel quality control … because I like nature, somebody told me, 'Hey, why don't you look at the wildlife program and see what they do?'" Smith said.
For the last five years, he's been an airport operations wildlife specialist with the airport's wildlife mitigation team. It is made up of six people, including Smith, who are needed 24/7.
The team is tasked with overseeing all animals that make their way onto airport property. From snakes to porcupines, herds of deer or antelope, even stray dogs or cats.
Alex Blanchard, the team's manager, told KSL-TV that the program's guidelines are overseen by the Federal Aviation Administration's wildlife hazard management plan.
"It pretty much states what all the hazards are at the airport, how the FAA plans on addressing those hazards, and who is responsible for dealing with those hazards, which is us," she said.
The team focuses on preventing animals from getting close to the aircrafts. One way is by modifying the airport's habitat to make it less attractive for animals. In one case, Blanchard said some areas of the airport have certain grasses that don't seed or flower. The team also makes sure ponding or other water is removed to not attract certain birds.
Another way to prevent issues with animals is by "hazing," using pyrotechnics like sirens, horns, even fireworks to force animals off the property, which Blanchard said is effective. Another measure is population control, which includes relocating the animals.
"If we get a lot of mammals on the field, if we get a lot of reptiles, omnivores or snakes, porcupines, other little mammals, rabbits, we relocate them to our wetlands," Blanchard said.
The most common animal they relocate are birds, especially during the spring and fall migration seasons. The team makes different traps for different birds that are placed throughout the airport property away from the tarmac in order to prevent bird strikes.
Some traps have a trigger stick that forces the trap shut surrounded by soft netting keeping the bird inside. Another small trap requires the team to place a small rodent such as a mouse inside a small dome to protect it from getting hurt. Thin wires surrounding the dome then trap the bird's feet.
Before the birds are relocated they're processed. This requires the team to take down the bird's measurements, from its wing span to its weight, taking its picture and adding a numbered band on its leg. That information is then put into a national database with the U.S. Geological Survey, which she said makes the program stronger.
"We really wanted to have a lot more information, not just on the birds that we track, but their patterns and the way they behave, what their movements are," she said. "It also helps us formulate our plan on the field itself to say migration is coming. (Do) we need to put certain types of traps? (Do) we need to be increasing our inspections? (Do) we need to increase our services so that we have less damage on our aircraft?"
Blanchard said this fall migration, they had more damaging bird strikes compared to last year.
"We believe that because winter last year was so wet and a whole bunch of birds were able to survive, there were more birds in the airspace, a lot of birds lived a lot a lot longer, then we got a lot more strikes from big-bodied birds," said Blanchard.
While it's not a program a lot of people think about, Smith said it's important.
"Birds and planes don't mix, and there's a lot of birds and a lot of airplanes," said Smith.
