Engineering Commons^™

Utilizing Uas To Support Wildlife Hazard Management Efforts By Airport Operators, Flavio A. C. Mendonca, Ryan Wallace

Publications

The FAA requires airports operating under the Code of Federal Regulations Part 139 to conduct a wildlife hazard assessment (WHA) when some wildlife-strike events have occurred at or near the airport. The WHA should be conducted by a Qualified Airport Wildlife Biologist (QAWB) and must contain several elements, including the identification of the wildlife species observed and their numbers; local movements; daily and seasonal occurrences; and the identification and location of features on and near the airport that could attract wildlife. Habitats and land-use practices at and around the airport are key factors affecting wildlife species and the size of …

Utilizing Uas To Support Wildlife Hazard Management Efforts By Airport Operators, Flavio A. C. Mendonca, Ryan Wallace, Anthony Chimino, Jose Cabrera Jr, Robert Sliwinski

Publications

Purpose of our Study:

To investigate how UAS technologies could be safely and effectively applied to identify hazardous wildlife species to aviation operations as well as potential wildlife hazard attractants within the airport jurisdiction.

An Analysis Of Wildlife Strikes To Aircraft In Brazil: 2011-2018, Flavio A. C. Mendonca, Julius Keller, Chenyu Huang Ph.D.

Publications

Purpose: Aircraft accidents due to wildlife hazards have become a growing safety and economic problem to the Brazilian and international aviation industries. These safety occurrences have resulted in significant direct and indirect economic losses as well injuries and fatalities worldwide. The purpose of this study was to develop empirical information obtained from the analysis of wildlife strike and aircraft operations data in Brazil that could be used for accident prevention efforts.

Design/methodology: The research team collected and analyzed aircraft operations as well as wildlife strike data from the 32 busiest commercial airports in Brazil, from 2011 through 2018. …

Wildlife Hazards At Airports: A Practical Review, Robert Sliwinski, Flavio A. C. Mendonca

Publications

Globally, aircraft accidents and incidents due to wildlife strikes are an increasingly serious safety concern;

Airport operators have a professional and legal responsibility to provide an environment conducive to safe aircraft operations;

Airport operators and managers have been sued for property damage and / or for human injuries and death in the aftermath of aircraft accidents due to wildlife strikes.

Mitigating The Risk Of Bird Strikes: The Use Of Virtual Reality During Flight Training, Flavio A. C. Mendonca Ph.D., Julius Keller Ph.D., Chien-Tsung Lu, Chenyu Huang Ph.D.

Publications

There were 193,969 wildlife strikes in the US from 1990 through 2017. Wildlife strikes annually cost the US civil aviation industry, on average, $186 million in monetary losses and 111,284 hours of aircraft downtime (Dolbeer & Begier, 2019). According to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), Aeronautical Decision-Making (ADM) is a systematic approach that encourages pilots to identify hazards and manage risks (FAA, 2016). Additionally, it helps aviators to make timely and safe decisions. Even though it is practically impossible to eliminate the risk of bird strikes, crewmembers play a vital role in the accident prevention process (Mendonca, Carney, & Fanjoy, …

Bird Hazard Mitigation Training For Part 141 General Aviation Pilots: An Experimental Study, Flavio A. C. Mendonca, Richard O. Fanjoy Phd, Thomas Q. Carney

Publications

From 1990 through 2018 ==> 209,950 wildlife strikes in the U.S.,

Approximately 95% of those incidents involved birds;

Seventy aircraft destroyed as a result of wildlife strikes!

13 bird strikes 32 ==> fatalities;

• 244 wildlife strikes ==> 319 people injured!
• 224 bird strikes ==>299 people injured!

General aviation community;

• 97% of the strikes occurred below 3,500 feet AGL;
• There were 22,775 wildlife strikes ==> 26% caused damage to the aircraft!

Wildlife Hazard Management: An Analysis Of Wildlife Strikes Data From The Five Busiest Airports In Brasil: 2011-2018, Flavio A. C. Mendonca, Julius Keller, Carlos F. G. Schonhardt

Publications

Brasil ==> the largest country in Latin America - 8.514.876 Km²;

Booming aviation industry;

• From 2008 through 2017 ==>7.1% per year;
• 104 million passengers in 2018;
• International destinations – 21.8 million (~20%);
• U.S. - 4.4 million passengers;
• Argentina – 3.8 million passengers;
• Portugal & Chile – 1.7 million passengers;
• Brazilian Airlines – 38.3%.

Domestic Passengers 200 million in 2030; International Passengers 55 million in 2030.

Bird Hazard Mitigation Training For General Aviation Pilots - A Prospective Research Study, Flavio A. C. Mendonca, Thomas Q. Carney

Publications

• General aviation industry
• 446,000 aircraft worldwide
• 211,000 in the U.S.
• Supports $219 billion in total economic output and 1.1 million jobs in the U.S
• Flies approximately 25 million flight hours (U.S.)
• Flies to more than 5,000 public airports
• Primary training ground for most commercial airline pilots

General Aviation Pilots’ Strategies To Mitigate Bird Strikes, Flavio A. C. Mendonca Ph.D., Thomas Q. Carney Ph.D.

Publications

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has partnered with the FAA since 1995.

USDA has assisted the FAA with production of yearly and special reports on wildlife hazards to aviation:

• Develop or enhance existing wildlife hazard management programs (including pilots)
• Create refinements in the development and implementation of integrated research and operational efforts to mitigate the risk of bird strikes

Mitigating The Risk: An Analysis Of Wildlife-Strike Data From São Paulo International Airport (Sbgr) [2011-2017], Flavio A. C. Mendonca Ph.D., Julius C. Keller Ph.D.

Publications

São Paulo (Guarulhos) International Airport;

• Busiest airport in South America;
• Major hub in Latin America;
• Commercial Operations - 93%;
• International Commercial Operations - 27.1%;
• Major routes – Argentina, Chile, and U.S;
• LATAM, GOL, Azul, American Airlines, Copa, Aerolineas Argentinas, TAP, United Airlines – Most International Flights.

2018 Bird Strike Committee Usa Meeting, Flavio A. C. Mendonca Ph.D., Carlos F.G. Schönhardt

Publications

Offshore Aviation in Brazil Since1980

Air passenger and cargo transport to offshore platforms began in the 1980s. The largest customer in Brazil is PETROBRAS, which ranked fifth in 2011 among the largest publicly traded oil companies in the world.

• Air passenger and Cargo Transport
• Medical Evacuation
• Helicopter Maintenance
• Helicopter Transport of External Cargo.

Constraints On Acoustic Signaling Among Birds Breeding In Secondary Cavities: The Effects Of Weather, Cavity Material, And Noise On Sound Propagation, John P. Swaddle, Caitlin R. Kight, Saji Perera, Eduardo Davila-Reyes, Shena Sikora

John Swaddle

Increasing evidence suggests that anthropogenic noise from urbanization affects animal acoustic communication. We investigated whether the begging calls of nestling Eastern Bluebirds (Sialia sialis) varied along a disturbance gradient of ambient noise. Contrary to our prediction and the results of a previous study of nestling Tree Swallows (Tachycineta bicolor), we found that nestling Eastern Bluebirds did not increase the amplitude or structural characteristics—including frequency, rate, and duration—of their vocalizations in response to ambient noise. However, we found that prevalent temperature and humidity conditions attenuated begging calls. Specifically, in warmer, more humid weather, vocalizations of nestling Eastern …

Three-Dimensional Simulation For Fast Forward Flight Of A Calliope Hummingbird, Jialei Song, Bret W. Tobalske, Don Powers, Tyson Hedrick, Haoxiang Luo

Faculty Publications - Department of Biological & Molecular Science

We present a computational study of flapping-wing aerodynamics of a calliope hummingbird (Selasphorus calliope) during fast forward flight. Three-dimensional wing kinematics were incorporated into the model by extracting time-dependent wing position from high-speed videos of the bird flying in a wind tunnel at 8.3 m s⁻¹. The advance ratio, i.e. the ratio between flight speed and average wingtip speed, is around one. An immersed-boundary method was used to simulate flow around the wings and bird body. The result shows that both downstroke and upstroke in a wingbeat cycle produce significant thrust for the bird to overcome …

Comment On Faa Rule Revision - Transport Category Aircraft, Paul F. Eschenfelder, Valter Battistoni

Paul F. Eschenfelder

No abstract provided.

The Figure Of Bitu-Man, Paul Royster

UNL Libraries: Faculty Publications

The ominously imposing figure in the above illustration is “the Syncrude bird deterrent device, locally known as ‘Bitu-man’.” He stands (or stood—the original image was from the late 1970s) in the tailings pond of the Syncrude Canada Ltd. oil sands mining operation along the Athabasca River near Fort McMurray in northeastern Alberta. That operation surface mines (i.e., strip mines) bitumen-impregnated sand, processes it with hot water and steam, and discharges the liquid effluent or “tailings” into a pond covering roughly 3000 hectares (11 square miles). (Google Map coordinates: 56.9°N, -111.3° W). Residue bitumen collects on the surface and poses a …

A Study Of Mexican Free-Tailed Bat Chirp Syllables: Bayesian Functional Mixed Modeling Of Nonstationary Time Series Data With Time-Dependent Spectra, Josue G. Martinez, Kirsten M. Bohn, Raymond J. Carroll, Jeffrey S. Morris

Jeffrey S. Morris

We describe a new approach to analyze chirp syllables of free-tailed bats from two regions of Texas in which they are predominant: Austin and College Station. Our goal is to characterize any systematic regional differences in the mating chirps and assess whether individual bats have signature chirps. The data are analyzed by modeling spectrograms of the chirps as responses in a Bayesian functional mixed model. Given the variable chirp lengths, we compute the spectrograms on a relative time scale interpretable as the relative chirp position, using a variable window overlap based on chirp length. We use 2D wavelet transforms to …

Constraints On Acoustic Signaling Among Birds Breeding In Secondary Cavities: The Effects Of Weather, Cavity Material, And Noise On Sound Propagation, John P. Swaddle, Caitlin R. Kight, Saji Perera, Eduardo Davila-Reyes, Shena Sikora

Arts & Sciences Articles

Increasing evidence suggests that anthropogenic noise from urbanization affects animal acoustic communication. We investigated whether the begging calls of nestling Eastern Bluebirds (Sialia sialis) varied along a disturbance gradient of ambient noise. Contrary to our prediction and the results of a previous study of nestling Tree Swallows (Tachycineta bicolor), we found that nestling Eastern Bluebirds did not increase the amplitude or structural characteristics—including frequency, rate, and duration—of their vocalizations in response to ambient noise. However, we found that prevalent temperature and humidity conditions attenuated begging calls. Specifically, in warmer, more humid weather, vocalizations of nestling Eastern …

The Aerodynamics Of Flapping Birdflight, Carol Coughlin, Virginia Institute Of Marine Science

Reports

No abstract provided.

Migratory Movements Of Emus And Control Efforts, John L. Long, T. J. Tozer

Journal of the Department of Agriculture, Western Australia, Series 4

ALTHOUGH little data has been recorded on movements or migrations of the Emu (Dromaius novea-hollandiae), it is well known throughout the farming community that some such movement occurs in September and October in most years at least.

A Mathematical Analysis Of The Dynamic Soaring Flight Of The Albatross With Ecological Interpretations, Carol Coughlin

Reports

The capability of flight plays a central role in the lives of most birds. Indeed, the existing morphological and ecological characteristics of many species are almost entirely dictated by the aerodynamic requirements of the highly developed flight modes they have acquired through evolutional specialization. In the case of such species, a clear understanding of the aerodynamic mechanisms underlying the particular flight modes can often provide a lucid insight into the basic physical relationships which govern a bird's characteristic activities and behavior.

This aerodynamic approach to the study of avian ecology is particularly useful in the case of soaring birds, where …

Local Control Of Crows By Trapping, C J. Woodbury

Journal of the Department of Agriculture, Western Australia, Series 4

THE common crow seen frequently around farms in the South-West is the raven (Corvus coronoides) whilst the pest of pastoral areas is the true Australian crow (Corvus cecilae).

Farmers and pastoralists, although recognising the importance of these birds as scavengers and destroyers of insects, particularly grasshoppers, sometimes for one reason or another, wish to reduce their numbers over a localised area.

Baiting with phosphorus has been used in the past, but the purpose of this article is to describe and illustrate a type of trap which has become universally known as the "Australian Crow Trap."