A day in the life of… a Bird Controller

Bitten by the Schiphol bug

When Liset stopped working as a stewardess a few years ago, she knew she wanted to remain in the world of aviation. Because, as she enthusiastically puts it, “Once you’ve been bitten by the Schiphol bug, you don’t ever want to leave.” Liset saw the vacancy for Bird Controller on the website and didn’t hesitate to apply. What she enjoys most about her job is the variety involved in driving around the runways and keeping birds at bay. “It’s also great to know that you are helping passengers arrive and depart safely, and working in teams makes the work really enjoyable too”.

Safety first

“My previous shift was rather quiet because of the warm weather, but you could see that there were a lot of young starlings in the fields. They don’t know about what the dangers can be yet so you need to put quite a bit of effort into chasing them away, they don’t really react. You sometimes have your hands full with that. But it’s also fun to try and come up with the best ways to chase them away. And if they get too close to the runway, you contact the control tower and let them know it’s too dangerous to take off because there’s a big group of starlings in the area. Safety comes first.”

More than just bird control

Bird Controllers work in shifts of around eight hours. There’s an early, late and night shift because it’s a 24-hour operation. Most days begin with a briefing and colleagues are informed of what happened during the previous shift. The job involves a lot more than just keeping birds away from the runways. Our Bird Controllers may discover that a runway needs to be cleared of grit after it has been deployed frequently for landings, or that the grass around a runway has been cut meaning that there may be more of certain types of bird in the area. No two days are the same and the work even changes depending on the time of day and season. For example, there aren’t many birds on hot summer days and during the night there are other wildlife, like foxes, to take into consideration. Sometimes, the Bird Controllers even have to deal with escaped animals!

Cat on the loose

“Not that long ago we received a report of a cat on the loose. That’s not something that happens often, it was my first time. Quite a few colleagues went after the cat and it was very difficult to catch it because it was stressed. We caught it in the end, I actually caught it, and that was funny because a colleague then contacted the tower and said “Lapwing colleague Ms. Muis (Dutch for mouse) has caught the cat.” Those kinds of moments are funny. That’s when you also realise that colleagues are always ready to help. You tell them to go that way, for example, and together you make a kind of mission out of it”.

Liset is one example of many colleagues with great stories to tell about their work at the airport. Keep an eye on our social media channels for more blogs about a day in the life of different employees at Schiphol!