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Joe Godfrey |
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| About the Author ... |
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Joe Godfrey mixes his love of flying with a
love of music. He is an instrument-rated private pilot who flies a 1974 Bellanca
Viking based at Palomar airport just north of San Diego, Calif. He composes
music for commercials, films, broadcast and corporate media and has composed and
produced thousands of music tracks for America's largest advertisers. In
addition to writing for AVweb, Joe contributes to
The Aviation Consumer
and IFR Magazine.
He is a director and pilot for
Angel
Flight West, a non-profit organization that uses private airplanes to fly
indigent medical patients. He is married and lives in Leucadia, California.
So far, Joe is the only AVweb staff member who has logged time with Ella Fitzgerald and
conducted the London Symphony.
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"Sometimes
we forget that we share the air with animals that have been flying for millions
of years, and there's still a lot we can learn from them," says Bill
Lishman, chairman and CEO of Operation Migration. Lishman's autobiography, Father
Goose, inspired the 1995 film Fly Away Home starring Jeff Daniels,
Anna Paquin and Dana Delaney. The film tells the story of Lishman's successful
efforts to lead flocks of geese on their flight south by acting as a surrogate
parent. Working with naturalist William Carrick, Lishman led the birds around
Ontario, teaching them a safe migration route. Lishman came to AirVenture '99 to
explain the project, share his experiences, and raise funds for future work.
In 1988, Lishman became the first man to fly in formation with a flock of
birds, imprinting them to an Easy Riser ultralight that he built. Larry Mauro
designed the trike in the mid-'70s, probably never expecting it to dress like a
goose. After some experimentation, the team found that Mauro's design had a
similar flight envelope to the whooping crane. Lishman and his partner, Joe
Duff, brought three airplanes to Oshkosh to display outside the exhibition
halls, including their original Easy Riser. Before founding Operation Migration,
Lishman was a sculptor and Duff was one of Canada's leading commercial
photographers. Joining Lishman and Duff at Oshkosh is teammate Deke Clark, a
former F-86 pilot and UAL 777 captain. Clark thinks that trikes are the safest
airplanes he has ever flown.
The goal of the
project is to teach endangered birds the migration patterns necessary for
survival. Geese are not endangered, but Lishman knew that he would never get
support for his work unless he established a track record with non-endangered
birds. Based on their success with Canada geese, in 1997 they flew a flock of
seven sandhill cranes from Ontario to Virginia. The cranes spent the winter
there under supervision and were given freedom to fly in late February. In late
March Kate Sutherland, the biologist who tended them during the winter, reported
that they had not returned yet from their daily foraging trip. Two days later
the birds were back in Ontario, sharing recess with school children. Over the
next couple of weeks the birds relocated to a site about 30 miles away from
their original fledgling grounds.
Operation Migration is now turning its attention to the only remaining flock
of whooping cranes. They plan to establish a second flock with its own unique
migratory route. The north site, which will be the nesting site, will be in one
of three sites in Wisconsin. When Lishman and Duff leave Oshkosh, they'll head
south — minus the birds — to scout a migratory route to the winter site in
Florida. Next year they'll fly the route with sandhill cranes, and if that trip
is successful they'll take whooping cranes in 2001. Operation Migration is
privately funded with small donations, but Lishman says that fundraising takes
time away from working with the birds and he's looking for a corporate sponsor.
Lishman spent Saturday night talking to the crowd in the Theatre in the Woods
about what it's like to fly with the birds. "The birds really know how to
enjoy the beauty of the earth. They know instinctively to fly in the calm air of
the morning and the evening. We fly at about 500 agl, about 30 knots, where you
can really see things." Once the flock is airborne, it doesn't matter if
the trike is in the lead. Lishman has flown in front, behind and in the middle
of the birds. "It's cool to slow down," Lishman said, "and let
them pass you. I call it 'IFR in geese'."
He explained
the aerodynamics of the V pattern. "The hardiest bird takes the lead at the
point. With each downbeat of his wings, the lead bird creates a wingtip vortex.
The trailing birds sense this nuance in the air and surf on it, which makes
their job of flying slightly easier. This lets a group of birds of differing
abilities fly at a constant speed with a common endurance. The wave generated by
the lead bird forms a 'V' and results in the typical chevron formation that we
see overhead." Lishman also offered a simpler explanation for the V.
"We found out as soon as we lined up behind the birds. They relieve
themselves in the air, so we think the V pattern is just plain common
sense."
Lishman went quietly about his work until ABC's 20/20 aired on
Thanksgiving Day in 1993. Millions of people saw the show, including some folks
at Columbia Pictures. Once they bought the story they took some liberty with the
plot. Lishman says Hollywood made three basic changes to the story. In truth,
Lishman's wife didn't get killed, his 13-year-old daughter didn't fly the second
airplane (Joe Duff did), and their airplane wasn't shaped like a bird. "The
birds didn't seem to care if the airplane looked like a bird," he said.
Columbia promised a share of the profits to Operation Migration, but Hollywood's
creative accounting procedures show Fly Away Home losing $37 million.
"I guess we owe them now," Lishman says.
The first step
in working with the birds is to collect eggs. The eggs are placed in incubators
and turned three times a day to simulate what real mama birds do. The imprinting
process begins when the handlers play a recording of the aircraft engine and
talk to the eggs as they turn them. The first thing the hatchlings see are the
handlers, dressed in feathered costumes made out of pillowcases. The young birds
stay under heat lamps until they are strong enough to start exercising, then a
handler leads them, carrying a small replica of the ultralight aircraft. Again
the tape-recorded engine sounds are played to them. When birds are imprinted in
this manner they easily transition to the real aircraft when it is introduced.
As the birds grow and develop feathers, they follow the handler and aircraft
up and down the runway, which Duff calls "taxi tests." When the
handler feels they're ready for their first flight, the birds follow the
ultralight as it lifts into the air. If the weather permits, the birds fly twice
a day to build their strength and endurance for the fall migration.
The two Canadians were among friends on Saturday night. EAA's Theatre in the
Woods is just a short walk from the ultralight camp at Wittman Field. Lishman
says, "We started as artists, and now we've become scientists." He's
happy that their work has inspired films, photography and other migratory bird
projects around the world. Joe Duff adds, "We're aviators. We have the
chance to return the favor to those who taught us flight."
Operation Migration's excellent
web
site gives you more information on history, upcoming projects, and how you
can adopt a crane.
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