The same article is in today's Canberra Times (and very likely also in the
(Sunday) Sydney Morning Herald). The survey was started by my then boss at
CSIRO, the late Dr Wayne Braithwaite. I managed to stay out of the surveys as
in those days I was a lousy flier (and probably still am in light aircraft).
The surveys went on for at least a month and when Wayne came home at the end of
them he had a grey complexion usually from the stress, due no doubt to the fact
that the counting was done as low as 50 feet from the ground in a light
aircraft. He would transcribe all the data from tape recorders in to a database
which took quite some time. He then took several weeks off work to recuperate!
He had many stories of near misses with powerlines and cables, especially near
some power plants in the Hunter area. The aircraft generally belonged to the
NSW NPWS and many of their staff were involved in the surveying. On one
occasion, about a week after the finish of a survey, the NPWS aircraft exploded
and killed the pilot - I can't remember if it was on the ground or in the air -
but regardless still a tragic event and a reminder of just how dangerous these
surveys could be. This is another example of work undertaken by CSIRO that has
managed to survive, thanks to Dr Kingsford. Unfortunately at the time various
governments couldn't see the benefit of it. Nothing seems to have changed!!
Happy New Year to all.
Mark
-----Original Message-----
From: Con Boekel
Sent: Sunday, 27 December 2015 8:21 AM
To: canberrabirds chatline
Subject: link to article in The Age on waterbird numbers
http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/falling-number-of-waterbirds-in-australias-east-sounds-alarm-20151221-glt0b4.html
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