The wildlife habitats around the Upper Cumberland Regional Airport under study as considerations for commercial flights at the facility continue.
Airport Manager Dean Selby said USDA workers travel the perimeter weekly to document what kind of wildlife lives nearby. Selby said the goal is to change the things that attract wildlife to the airport property.
“We’re just trying to get them to move away from the airport a little bit and stay away from the runway,” Selby said. “The goal is to not kill anything, the goal is to just make it not want to live here, not create the stuff that attracts it to this area.”
Selby said the workers have been on site for six months and have another six months to go. Selby said the crews have already made suggestions.
“As you know, in Tennessee, we have a lot of deer. How can we prevent deer ingress into the airport? Those pose a huge hazard to aircraft,” Selby said. “And one of the ways is fencing, so they’ve already suggested that we replace the fencing with taller fencing.”
Selby said the crews suggested some areas that were not previously mowed needed to be mowed. Selby said the crews also pointed out areas of water retention.
“There was a couple of areas near culverts that were around the airport where water was standing that we have re-sculpted the ground around it to get rid of water,” Selby said. ” We just went ahead and preemptively took care of that.”
Selby said these airport modifications related to wildlife will help any plane that utilizes the airport.
“If they stay away from the runway, the chances of them getting hit are much, much diminished,” Selby said. “And that’s kind of what it means to general aviation and to the commercial flights, because the same thing, the same threats are to general aviation are a threat to commercial aviation.”
Selby said the airport received grant funds to make these wildlife related changes. Selby said so far, most of the work has been done internally.
Selby said the process to be certified to accept commercial flights is still two to three years away.
