Wildlife Flying: It's for the Birds


An Embry-Riddle graduate's bird's-eye view lets aerial surveyors navigate hundreds of acres of swampland

Plane Flying LowBy Stephen T. Schwikert, BASC'71

There we were, flying along at 1,000 feet in a Cessna Superhawk. The broad expanse of the Florida Everglades spreads out before us like an endless sea of grass. I'm a wildlife technician/pilot flying for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. Today, with a wildlife biologist along as an observer, we're searching for wood stork, egret, heron, and ibis nesting colonies for a statewide water bird breeding survey by the Fish and Wildlife Commission.

It's excessively warm this day, as are most days in south Florida. This, combined with the constant drone of the Lycoming O-320-112AD engine, makes it hard not to drift off into a relaxed state of semi-consciousness. I scan the instruments more frequently than normal, re-check my location on the map and search the sky for other traffic-anything to fight off the dull routine associated with flying long transects during an aerial wildlife survey.

Suddenly, the boredom is shattered by a cry: "There's one!" I quickly check to see on which side of the plane the biologist is looking. At the same instant, one of my hands pulls on the carburetor heat and reduces power, while the other is banking the plane in the direction of the sighting and applying slight backpressure on the yoke to bleed off airspeed. When the needle of the airspeed indicator hits the white arc, I drop 10 degrees of flaps to give the aircraft more stability and lower its stall speed-a necessity for the maneuvers required to maintain contact with the target.

The biologist calls out again, "There it is, at two o'clock. Do you see it?"

I strain my eyes and see a cluster of small white dots scattered about an island of willow trees. "Got it," I say, as I bank a little tighter and kick in more right rudder to bring the plane around. I ease off on the backpressure and increase the power just enough to hold the airspeed at around 60 knots. As we cruise by the water bird colony at 300 feet, I roll the aircraft into a rather steep angle of bank. I continue to circle the colony using the right combination of flight controls and power to let the biologist get a good view, count the birds, and record the information. I apply full power, carburetor heat off, wing flaps up, and enough backpressure to establish best rate-of-climb speed. Back up at our cruising altitude, we hunt for the next spot, where the fun will begin all over again.

Cessna 172On another day, I could be looking for bald eagle nests in north Florida, osprey nests around the lakes of central Florida, American crocodiles in the Florida Keys, or brown pelican nests and shorebird or waterfowl concentrations along both coasts. I've also spent countless hours searching the airwaves for the steady "beep-beep-beep" signals coming from radio telemetry transmitters attached to individual animals that allow biologists to follow their movements. I've radio-tracked sandhill and whooping cranes, black bears, Florida panthers, alligators, gopher tortoises, fox squirrels and even an indigo snake.

In more than 28 years of flying aerial wildlife surveys, I've flown over virtually every part of Florida, from the Gulf of Mexico to the Atlantic Ocean, and from Panama City to the Dry Tortugas. I have a treasure chest of fond memories, like the time in 1982 when I spotted a female Florida panther, followed by her twin spotted kittens, walking down a levy in the Big Cypress Swamp of south Florida. This was in the early days of the Florida Panther Project, when biologists weren't even sure if a breeding population existed in Florida.

I've flown high next to a pair of bald eagles as they spun, with locked talons, in aerial courtship; zoomed low over the marsh to get an accurate egg or chick count at a crane nest sight; and was awe-struck by a gigantic leatherback turtle swimming down the intracoastal waterway.

But it hasn't always been blue skies and fair winds. Over the years, I've had to learn and relearn many lessons. One happened during the summer of 1983, when I was flying two panther telemetry flights a day from the Naples airport on the southwest coast of Florida to track six different cats in the Big Cypress Swamp. This particular flight was the dawn patrol. It was a routine flight I had made many times before. On this day, however, my supervisor, Tommy Hines, the chief biologist on the Florida Panther Project, was going along with me.

The weather briefing that morning called for clear skies with good visibility. There was a chance of late morning to afternoon rain showers coming ashore from the Gulf of Mexico. In south Florida this is pretty much a daily summer forecast. Survey flying is restricted to day VFR (visual flight rules) only, and on all the previous morning flights, I had returned to the airport before the showers arrived.

With full fuel and an eager passenger, I took off into the sunrise and headed southeast. I started tracking the radio transmitter locations one by one. It's not uncommon for these big cats to move many miles overnight, so it was taking us more time than normal to find them. I finally managed to locate all six felines and plotted their locations on the map.

After we finished with the tracking, Hines asked if we could look at a different panther habitat in an area further east than I normally fly. A quick check of my Hobbs hour meter (I never trust the fuel gauges) and the clock told me I had enough fuel for a short foray. After we finished looking over several of these areas, I told Hines, "Due to the time and fuel levels, we need to head back now." I turned the plane toward the west and started for Naples airport.

After about 30 minutes, I saw some dark, ominous-looking clouds ahead. Again, this is typical summertime flying in Florida. The closer I got to these clouds, however, the more threatening they looked, so I dialed up the frequency for the Naples airport ATIS (automatic terminal information service). The report I received told me the storm had already passed and the airport was clear. At this point, I was only about 10 miles east of the airport. I'd be fine if I could just get on the other side of the squall line.

My first thought was to go under the cloud layer. I started descending slowly until I was bumping the base of the clouds at 500 feet. I wasn't going to be able to get under this layer at a safe altitude. My next plan was to execute an end run around the line of clouds to the south near the town of Everglades City. I started in that direction, but soon found myself over water and headed out into the Gulf. The visibility was poor and I still couldn't see any end to the cloud bank. So, I turned back inland just east of the advancing clouds. The squall line was rapidly moving east and I had to come up with another plan quickly.

Because of the extra time we had taken during this flight, my remaining fuel was becoming a critical factor. I realized that I had two options. First, I could try to make it to a small private strip located off Alligator Alley about 35 miles east of Naples. If I couldn't make it there before the storm arrived, my second option was to fly east, where the weather was good, until I found a good spot to make an emergency landing before my fuel ran out. The turbulence was increasing and the sky was growing darker with each minute.

As luck would have it, we beat the storm to the Alligator Alley airport and I started my approach. I was flying through a light rain now, but still just ahead of the main storm. I decided to fly over the field once, at a low altitude, to check the condition of the runway. I needed to determine if the water was too deep to attempt a safe landing. As I slowed the plane to get a good look, things quickly started to go terribly wrong.

The swirling winds, gusting and getting stronger, were now coming from my tail. That, combined with my slow speed, caused the airplane to start to settle. I had failed to remember a basic rule of aerodynamics: Every knot of wind coming from the tail negates a knot coming from the nose. Like a canoe going down a river, you have to go faster than the current to have control. I added full power, but response was slow and the plane continued to descend. I took a quick glance at Hines, who had turned a whiter shade of pale. Outside, I could see we were quickly approaching a large dome of cypress trees ahead and still descending.

Just then, I heard the voice of my father, my first flight instructor, ringing in my ears: "You fly the plane. Don't let the plane fly you!"

With that in mind, I pushed forward on the yoke and kept the plane at a slight nose-down, wings-level attitude. The natural tendency would have been to pull back and make a turn to avoid the trees. My experience told me not to attempt that, as we were very close to the stall speed. Finally, after what seemed like a lifetime, we started gaining speed, and with that came lift. We managed to just clear the cypress trees and circled around to make a soggy landing.

I had just taxied to a stop and shut down the engine when the bottom dropped out of the storm. The winds howled and shook the plane back and forth. A deafening torrent of large raindrops pelted the outside of the aircraft. Lightning flashed and thunder boomed all around us. After about 15 minutes, the storm had passed and the sun was shining brightly. Much relieved that we were safe, I rechecked our fuel and determined we had enough to make the short trip back to Naples.

Wildlife survey flying can be difficult and more dangerous than many other flying professions. There's something special and exciting about maneuvering an aircraft low and slow, and being able to find an animal in the middle of nowhere, using nothing but a compass, map and pilotage. However, you must be willing to endure personal sacrifices and hardships with the ultimate benefit to the wildlife resource as your only reward.

After graduating from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, I worked for a time flying with both commuter and charter aviation companies before I decided that being a wildlife pilot was what I really wanted to do. I've had occasion to wonder if I made the right decision, especially when I think of the high salaries and magnificent equipment available with the airlines today. But then I recall what a senior captain for Delta Air Lines told me in 1986. He had more than 30 years of experience flying everything from the early DC-3 to the stretch version of the DC-8. He said that his flying career was great, but that he'd give anything to trade places with me. With that and my many fond memories, I figure I made the right choice.