IMPACT OF FOREST COVER IN THE AIRPORTS ON THE WILDLIFE

Abstract

The occurrence of animal collisions has been present since the early days of aviation and causes billion-dollar losses to civil aviation annually. The current scenario of accidents requires investigation into the contribution of external factors to the airport environment for the presence of wildlife. In this context, the present study aimed to quantify the forest cover and urban infrastructure in the airport safety area (ASA) of civil airports, as well as the occurrence events of wildlife sightings, near-collisions, and collisions with aircraft. 134 airports were analyzed, and raster were generated with the classification of forest and urban areas for the ASA of each airport. Descriptive statistics of the data were performed, as well as an evaluation of whether forest cover and urban infrastructure around airports contribute to potentialize or reduce the number of wildlife collisions recorded in 2020. It was observed that the expansion of urban infrastructure in cities had a positive relationship with the increase in the number of occurrences of wildlife sightings, collisions, and near-collisions with aircraft at Brazilian airports for the analyzed period. The influence of forest cover in the ASA of airports did not return significant results, being a factor that requires further studies to verify its relationship with wildlife events.