Airport wildlife often unruffled.

Byline: Bob Welch / The Register-Guard

ERIC BRANDT, a 48-year-old Eugene man, looked out the window of the America West jet as it touched down at Eugene Airport last month. That's when he saw it: what looked to be a coyote staring at the plane from beside the runway.

"It was," he recalls, "surprisingly undisturbed considering the plane was roaring by at 180 miles per hour."

Plastic foam, it turns out, is unflappable. But if you're a Canada goose preparing to land at Eugene Airport, you're apt to take one look at that hungry fake coyote and divert your flight path to, say, nearby Fern Ridge International. And when that happens, Rich Weiss, the airport's airfield maintenance supervisor, and the other boys out in the airfield shop high-five each other.

Welcome to one small segment of Eugene Airport's Wildlife Management program: Keep birds out of the paths of jets.

The crew's pursuit of bird-free skies is part serious and part Bill Murray trying to trap gophers in the movie "Caddyshack."

The serious part is this: More than 400 people have been killed worldwide as a result of "bird strikes," according to the national Bird Strike Committee USA. In the '90s, wildlife cost U.S. civil aviation more than $390 million. Nearly 6,000 bird strikes were reported by U.S. civil aircraft in 2000 alone.

While Eugene hasn't had any serious problems, in January 2001 a jet leaving Portland International Airport with 217 passengers aboard had to abort its takeoff when an engine ingested a Herring gull and quit.

The physics explain why: A 12-pound Canada goose struck by a 150-mph aircraft at liftoff generates the force of a half-ton weight dropped from a height of 10 feet.

Not funny. But Weiss & Co.'s multifront approach to this challenge does have its lighter side. Among the crew's methods of discouraging birds are a couple of beach ball-sized blowups called "Terror-Eyes," inflatable "predators." Hooked to a rope, they slide back and forth over a pond on the south end of the airport, controlled by pulleys so the evil eyes can be repositioned from week to week.

"Over there, that's Uncle Sam," says the 49-year-old Weiss, pointing to a larger-than-life bald eagle. "We move him to about 25 different locations."

You think airport security is tough? Try listening to the high-pitched recordings of birds in distress. Try landing on top of a runway sign or wind indicator that's guarded by something called porcupine wire. Try flocking together for a convention in Quadrant P4 - you're liable to prompt a blast from one of the airport's three radio-controlled noise cannons or get a "pistol hazing" - booms not bullets.

I know what you're thinking: that such terrorist tactics aren't going to fly in a place such as Eugene. But, says Weiss, he and his crew stay within the law and aren't out to harm wildlife.

"We're trying to keep people safe and birds safe," he says.

THAT'S BECOMING increasingly harder in that many bird populations have grown dramatically the past few decades, largely because of wildlife protection programs.

Thus, do Weiss & Co. honk horns, create "holographic trees" with shiny tape, line hangar roofs with bird repellent and reposition two fake coyotes that they ordered out of a Cabela's outdoor catalog. They even keep a daily log. Last April 4, for example, 500 geese were successfully moved west from Quadrants F4 and K5 with "five banger shells and 12 cannon shells."

Passengers think of an airport as gates and runways. But Weiss sees it as 2,500 acres - most natural and, thus, attractive to birds - of fields, vegetation and ponds.

At times, the tower calls with a report of birds of a feather flocking together. "We have maybe seven minutes to get out there and get those geese out of there," says Weiss. "You have to make some quick decisions."

Late summer and fall are the worst times. Geese, with harvest finished, flock to fields that abut the airport. Gulls come with the rains. In the spring, starlings and swallows begin swooping and roosting.

"There are `social trees' for birds and trees that aren't social," Weiss says. "We don't want social trees here. We don't want pie-cherry trees. Basically, we don't want anything that makes a bird to feel welcome here."

At airport conventions, special sessions are devoted to this kind of stuff. Vendors show up with their latest answers, including falcons, collies and laser-light beams.

"We're thinking of bringing in some `people mannequins,' ' Weiss says. "Farmer Brown types out in their fields."

Might go well with the "flying people" art inside the airport. The question is: Will they work? Or will anything work, completely?

"We don't ever win a war around here," Weiss says. "Just a few battles."