February 8, 2022 A Different Kind of Air Bee & Bee

The Liberty Gazette

February 8, 2022

Ely Air Lines

By Mike Ely and Linda Street-Ely 

One of the unanticipated results of reduced commercial air travel is that with less activity from the man-made world, insects are finding an environment more to their liking. A consequence of less noise, less pollution, and less movement is more bees and wasps making nests in aircraft pitot (pronounced pee-toe) tubes. Last summer’s reports were buzzing particularly at London’s Heathrow Airport and Australia’s Brisbane Airport, where the invasions caused dozens of flights to return to the airport or abort takeoffs entirely. 

Pitot tubes are attractive to bees and especially to wasps because the tube offers a nice dark place to build a nest. All aircraft have pitot tubes, some have more than others, and it’s good practice to put the cover on any time an aircraft is not flying. 

Pitot tube with cover

These tubes are critical to flight because they take in air and measure the pressure, providing a read-out
inside the airplane for the airspeed indicator. Precise airspeed is necessary especially when taking off and landing. In those phases of flight, the pilot needs to know exactly when to “rotate” (pull the yoke back to lift off the ground) and how much power to pull back to ease the plane onto the runway. There’s a minimum airspeed needed to create lift, which keeps an aircraft flying, so as you can see, the ability to read the measurements derived from the pitot tube makes that device one of the star players of your vacation. 

Among the insects found to be totally tubular at Heathrow were the Wall Mason wasp, which seemed to favor British Airways’ Airbus A319, and the leafcutter bee, which showed far better taste in taking a liking to Virgin Atlantic’s Airbus A330. 

On the pre-prison island of Australia, consulting firm Eco Logical Australia was hired to run a three-year experiment with the goal of figuring out which airplanes the pests liked best. They created 3D-printed mock pitot tubes of various sizes and opened the wasp B-and-Bs for business. The keyhole wasp, of the species Pachodynerus nasidens, gave the Boeing 737’s large-diameter pitot tube five stars for luxury accommodations, and gave researchers greater insight into their behavior. 

Since an unblocked pitot tube is so important to the safety of flight, learning these insects’ behaviors and preferences helps pilots be more vigilant when doing pre-flight inspections. Experts say it takes the keyhole wasp less than 20 minutes to set up house in an uncovered pitot tube. This species wasn’t discovered in Brisbane until 2010. They came to the Outback from the Caribbean and Central and South America.

But just as vital as it is to cover the pitot tubes after shutting down the engines, you can bet your bottom dollar that remembering to remove those covers before the next flight is of equal importance. It turns out that, along with the increased reports of bee and wasp nests stopping up the airflow, forgetting to remove the covers has also resulted in a few rejected take-offs, although fewer than those caused by squatter insects thinking it's their new "Air Bee and Bee."

ElyAirLines.blogspot.com