TEN YEARS OF BIRDSTRIKES IN THE ISRAELI AIR FORCE

Over the past ten years, the Israeli Air Force (IAF) had lost two pilots and two fighters in severe air collisions with birds. During these years there have been 2330 birdstrikes, which 200 of them ended with damage (accidents). The unique location of Israel as a junction of three continents causes hundreds of millions migrating birds to cross its airspace during spring and autumn, especially soaring birds that create a significant risk for low-level flights. In 1983, BPZ (Bird Plagued Zones) regulations were implemented so that low-level flight activity of jet planes were separated from the migrating birds temporally and physically. This led to a dramatic decrease in the number of accidents. Since the early eighties, the relative number of birdstrikes on route is gradually decreasing, but the migration is still the dominant cause for the number and severity of birdstrikes over Israel. Most of the birdstrikes occur during spring (March-May) and Autumn (September-November), mainly with low-level flights of helicopters and transporters. 970 feathers were identified in the last 10 years from 110 different species (20 % of all the known species in Israel). The most frequent species involved in birdstrikes are the Stone Curlew (Burhinus oedicnemus), Feral Pigeon (Columba livia) and Spur Winged Plover (Vanellus spinosus)