🌅 Airports Reducing Bird Strikes with K9s

SOURCE

West Virginia International Yeager Airport

WHAT TO KNOW

• West Virginia International Yeager Airport in Charleston has used a border collie named Hercules to patrol its runways for wildlife for more than five years, helping reduce the population of animals around the airport by about two-thirds. Hercules—who has thousands of followers on Instagram and a children’s book chronicling his life—recently got a new K-9 partner named Ned, and together the duo have helped reduce bird strikes at the airport by around 70%.

WHY IT MATTERS

• Federal Aviation Administration data shows there were just over 19,600 reported instances of aircraft striking wildlife in the U.S. in 2023, averaging out to around 54 strikes per day. While most don’t result in death or serious injury, wildlife strikes involving civilian or military aircraft killed 499 people globally from 1988 to 2024, including at least 76 in the U.S.

CONNECT THE DOTS

• The FAA includes coyotes, deers, and bats in its definition of wildlife strikes, though the vast majority involve birds, including the 2009 “Miracle on the Hudson” US Airways flight, which went down after striking a flock of Canadian geese. Despite Hercules’ and Ned’s success reducing bird strikes at the Charleston airport, like all employees in the age of artificial intelligence, it appears automation could be coming for their jobs: an airport in Alaska recently tested robot dogs to help keep its runways clear of wildlife.