Bird
Control
at Schiphol
March 2019
Royal Schiphol Group
+31 (0)20 601 2673
schiphol.nl
youtube.com/schiphol
Welcome to Amsterdam Airport
Bird controller keeps
watch over birds and
aircraft
Amsterdam Airport Schiphol
is located in a polder
landscape, with a lot
of water, grassy meadows
and rich farmland. The
Amsterdamse Bos forest area,
the coast and the dunes are
located nearby, just as the
Westeinder, Vinkeveen and
Nieuwe Meer lakes. These
factors all contribute to
Schiphol being a popular
roost for birds. However,
birds constitute a genuine
risk for aircraft.
To ensure an optimum
degree of aviation safety,
Schiphol takes measures to
keep the birds as far away
from the aircraft as possible.
Schiphol employs 15 ‘bird
controllers’ solely for this
purpose. Another five
employees assist if necessary.
These bird controllers work in
the runway area to keep the
birds away at all hours of
the night and day.
The airport has also planted the surrounding area with
special varieties of grass, bushes and trees that are
unattractive to birds. All of the above measures are
designed to prevent ‘bird strikes’, or collisions between
birds and aircraft.
Birds can compromise safety at the airport. They pose a risk
to air traffic if they collide with aircraft landing or taking
off. As it is essential that the ‘aluminium birds’ and the real
birds are kept strictly separated, bird controllers take a
wide range of measures to chase birds away and
discourage them from roosting on the airport grounds.
Of course, not every collision causes immediate damage to
aircraft.
Habitat management
One of the most important measures the airport
takes to limit the number of bird strikes is to make
the runway area as unattractive to birds as possible. This is
called ‘habitat management’. Several species of bird like to
roost at Schiphol because they can find food here, or
because they feel safe in the area. As hardly any people
ever enter the runway area, it is a relatively undisturbed
spot that attracts birds. Amsterdam Airport Schiphol has
been trying to make the area as unattractive as possible for
birds by planting grasses, bushes and trees that birds don’t
like. The grass between the runways at Schiphol is longer
than you would normally see in a park or garden,
kept approximately 12 to 20 cm high in the airfield.
Schiphol applies a special method to mow its grass
to ensure it is kept at the desired length. Birds don’t
like tall grass, as it makes it more difficult for them
to find food and spot natural enemies, such as birds
of prey. The type of grass grown in the runway area has
also been adapted to repel birds. Special blends of coarse
grass that birds don’t like have been developed especially
Schiphol
You wouldn’t normally associate an
airport with nature, but Amsterdam
Airport Schiphol’s 1600-hectare
runway area offers a very special
natural environment. As people
rarely enter this area, its wild­­life has
flourished: you will find over
two hundred species of flowers
and plants here, including several
protected ones. Over seventy
species of birds populate Schiphol
as well, all of which receive
special attention from a very special
Schiphol team: the bird controllers.
for Schiphol. The airport is also experimenting with grasses
that are completely inedible. Additionally, monthly ‘hot
spot’ rounds are held, during which the maintenance staff
help identify locations that attract birds. These rounds
reveal if and where the management of trees and
shrubberies needs to be adapted. The runway area is also
kept dry by a special drainage system that prevents
puddles from forming after rainfall, as puddles also attract
birds. Bird Control also makes waterways around the
runway area less attractive to water birds by installing
green lasers, fixing ropes and/or netting across ditches
and canals or floating hopper balls in them.
Bird controller
Twenty-four hours a day and 365 days a year, the 15 bird
controllers employed by Amsterdam Airport Schiphol
ensure that air traffic is disturbed as little as possible by
birds. Their busiest periods are just after the nesting season
when young and inexperienced birds fly out, in summer
during harvesting operations in the vicinity of the airport
and in autumn when the birds start migrating. The
European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) holds airports
responsible for chasing away birds up to a height of 60
metres (200 ft) for landing air traffic and 150 metres (500
ft) for air traffic taking off. The bird controllers use a variety
of tools to chase away birds and continually patrol
the entire runway area in all-terrain vehicles, dubbed
‘lapwings’ (Kieviten in Dutch). The runways are always
inspected by a bird controller prior to being used.
They maintain radio contact with the air traffic controllers
in the tower, who warn the bird controllers if pilots report
the presence of birds in the vicinity of a runway.
Conversely, bird controllers will also notify air traffic control
of any birds they encounter that could pose a threat to air
traffic. The bird controllers also take note of many other
things besides birds. They remove foreign objects from the
runways, which could pose a hazard to aircraft, and report
any damage detected to signs, lights and asphalt.
They pay extra attention to obstacles such as construction
cranes in the vicinity of the runways, which must be parked
a certain minimum distance away. During rainy weather,
the runway is inspected for puddles and the bird
controllers also act as a guide for the snow fleet, driving
ahead when the fleet is called into action on the runways.
Bird dispersal equipment
There are various resources a bird controller can use
to keep birds away from the runways. Standard equipment
includes a flare gun with noise blanks, a bird alarm call
system and a green laser.
The flares and noise blanks come in various types,
including a number of ‘whizzers’. The flare used depends
on the bird species and the number of birds the controller
wants to scare away. Some species respond better to a
loud bang and others to a screeching noise. Bird controllers
also have all the most common bird alarm calls at their
disposal, which act as a warning for the other members of
the species to leave the area as soon as possible. All bird
controller vehicles are equipped with a mobile green laser.
This is a type of torch that emits a green laser beam to
chase water birds away from the surrounding ditches.
Other resources used by bird controllers include stationary
bird dispersal equipment such as gas canons, small
windmills, bird flashers (little mirrors), irritape (tape that
produces a shimmering effect) and scarymen (inflatable
scarecrows). However, as birds may get used to the
measures taken, Schiphol regularly tests new bird-chasing
methods and equipment.
Many different species of birds have more or less adopted
Amsterdam Airport Schiphol as their permanent home.
Although the airport would prefer to see its grounds
entirely free of birds, there are some that can barely be
chased away, if at all. This includes kestrels, buzzards and
grey herons, which nest in the vicinity of Schiphol and hunt
mice in the runway area.
Geese
The goose population around Amsterdam Airport
Schiphol has thanks to all measures taken, remained stable
over the past years. Geese continue to pose a serious risk to
aviation safety due to their size and tendency to fly in
flocks, while even a single goose can do substantial
damage to an aircraft. Far-reaching measures have been
taken at Schiphol and the surrounding area since 2005 to
keep away the geese, which do not actually roost on the
Schiphol runway area but cross Schiphol flying at various
altitudes. Schiphol regularly tests new extended range
noise blanks to repel flocks of geese.
It is also necessary to extend the preventative activities to
the area surrounding the airfield. In recent years, Schiphol
has conducted a great deal of research into the flight
patterns of geese moving between their sleeping, nesting,
moulting and feeding areas. These patterns have now
been charted, which will enable the airport to take even
more targeted measures against geese.
In order to reduce the goose population in the area
around Schiphol, the Game Management Units (Wild
Beheer Eenheden, WBE), the State Forestry Commission
(Staatsbosbeheer), the North Holland Landscape
Organisation, the Spaarnwoude Recreational Area
and the Amsterdamse Bos forest area treat goose
eggs to prevent hatching. Furthermore, geese may now be
shot. Geese primarily flock to the Haarlemmermeer area in
late summer to feed on field residues in the surrounding
farmland. In coming years, nearly all farmers near Schiphol
who raise grain crops will plough back their field residues
sooner following the harvest. This will eliminate a food
source for geese in the vicinity of Schiphol in August and
September. Many geese also fly over from Scandinavia to
spend the winter months in the Netherlands.
Control Group for Bird Strikes
In addition to the Ministry of Infrastructure and Water
Management and Amsterdam Airport Schiphol, the
Netherlands Control Group for Bird Strikes (NRV) includes
representatives from the Province of North Holland, the
Municipality of Haarlemmermeer, the Netherlands
Horticultural and Agricultural Organi­sation (Land- en
Tuinbouworganisatie Nederland, LTO), the Natural Heritage
Association (Natuurmonumenten; which acts also on behalf
of the Netherlands Association for the Protection of Birds
(Vogelbescherming Nederland)), the Ministry of Defence
and the Dutch Airline Pilots Association (Vereniging van
Nederlandse Verkeersvliegers, VNV).
This control group signed a covenant in April 2012 to jointly
tackle the goose issue in the area surrounding Schiphol. In
addition to all the measures stated above, the covenant
adopted a four-track plan to address the problem:
population management, crop adjustment, plans to adapt
the surrounding wetlands and innovative systems and
measures. With four radar stations we now have radar
coverage of the entire airport and some of the adjacent
lands as well. Eindhoven Airport also has entire radar
coverage. This is unique for Europe.
The NRV in 2017 has made recommendations regarding
the crops grown around the airport. On land that belongs
to Schiphol, crops are sown that are unattractive to geese.
The NRV will hold further talks with farmers about the
composition of their crops in 2019.
Bird counts
The bird controllers perform frequent bird counts in the
runway area in order to record the most common species
and their numbers. Doing this enables the airport to
identify trends and take action accordingly. The bird counts
also help the airport precisely measure the effectiveness of
a particular bird-chasing method on a specific species.
Using tablets, the bird controllers record all runway
inspections, dispersal operations and bird sightings.
All information is shared digitally. Their vehicles are also
fitted to read the radar images, and see registrations on
one screen. This enables them to take more effective
action.
The Flora and Fauna Act
In the interest of aviation safety, the province of
North Holland has declared Amsterdam Airport Schiphol
exempt from the Flora and Fauna Act, an act established
to protect wild plants and animals. This exemption means
that in certain circumstances birds may be chased away
and even killed if necessary. Schiphol uses this
authorisation as little as possible, and sees it as a last resort
when other bird-chasing methods have proven futile.
Reporting
Dead birds (or cadaver parts) are regularly found on
or near the runways. The bird’s death cannot always be
attributed directly to a collision with an aircraft.
Often, the turbulence caused by the wings of an aircraft
will simply knock birds flying nearby to the ground. At
Schiphol, the bird strike figure is calculated on basis of the
reports by homecarrier KLM. In 2018, 6.6 bird strikes were
recorded per 10,000 air transport movements (2017: 5.8).