How Birds Fooled Military Radar

MinuteEarth

To find out how you can help Nature Canada protect at least 30% of the world’s lands and ocean by 2030, visit https://www.naturecanada.ca/?utm_source=MinuteEarth. A technology to ignore birds on radar ended up being useful to study and conserve them. LEARN MORE ************** To learn more about this topic, start your googling with these keywords: Radar aeroecology - the use of radar to study airborne life, like birds, bats, and bugs Radar ornithology - the use of radar to study birds, especially bird migration Dual-polarization radar - radar that transmits and receives waves in both a horizontal and vertical orientation, giving a better idea of a target’s size, shape, and variety. Doppler effect - a change in a wave’s frequency in relation to whatever is observing it, such as a radar, but also your ears (it’s the reason a sound like an ambulance siren changes as it gets closer or further away from you). SUPPORT MINUTEEARTH ************************** If you like what we do, you can help us!: - Become our patron: https://patreon.com/MinuteEarth - Share this video with your friends and family - Leave us a comment (we read them!) CREDITS ********* Julián Gustavo Gómez (@TheJulianGomez) | Script Writer, Narrator and Director Sarah Berman (@sarahjberman) | Illustration, Video Editing and Animation Aldo de Vos, Know Art | Music MinuteEarth is produced by Neptune Studios LLC https://neptunestudios.info OUR STAFF ************ Sarah Berman • Arcadi Garcia i Rius David Goldenberg • Julián Gustavo Gómez Melissa Hayes • Alex Reich • Henry Reich • Peter Reich Ever Salazar • Leonardo Souza • Kate Yoshida OTHER CREDITS ***************** Radar footage by National Weather Service, BirdCast, and Alex Bencke Swallows footage by Ted Cheskey, Nature Canada OUR LINKS ************ Youtube | https://youtube.com/MinuteEarth TikTok | https://tiktok.com/@minuteearth Twitter | https://twitter.com/MinuteEarth Instagram | https://instagram.com/minute_earth Facebook | https://facebook.com/Minuteearth Website | https://minuteearth.com Apple Podcasts| https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/minuteearth/id649211176 REFERENCES ************** Bauer, Silke, et al. "The grand challenges of migration ecology that radar aeroecology can help answer." Ecography 42.5 (2019): 861-875. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ecog.04083 Dokter, Adriaan M., et al. "Bird migration flight altitudes studied by a network of operational weather radars." Journal of the Royal Society Interface 8.54 (2011): 30-43. https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsif.2010.0116 Duda, Jeff. "How to use and interpret Doppler weather radar." Retrieved July 18 (2009): 2014. https://meteor.geol.iastate.edu/~jdduda/portfolio/How%20to%20read%20and%20interpret%20weather%20radar.pdf Fox, Anthony D., and Patrick DL Beasley. "David Lack and the birth of radar ornithology." Archives of natural history 37.2 (2010): 325-332. https://www.euppublishing.com/doi/10.3366/anh.2010.0013 Gauthreaux Jr, Sidney A., and Carroll G. Belser. "Radar ornithology and biological conservation." The Auk 120.2 (2003): 266-277. https://www.jstor.org/stable/4090179 Hüppop, Ommo, et al. "Perspectives and challenges for the use of radar in biological conservation." Ecography 42.5 (2019): 912-930. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ecog.04063 Lack, David, and G. C. Varley. "Detection of birds by radar." Nature 156.3963 (1945): 446-446. https://www.nature.com/articles/156446a0 Marshall, S., & Toma, A. (2012, May 23). The close calls: How false alarms triggered fears of Nuclear War. Council for a Livable World. Retrieved November 2, 2021, from https://livableworld.org/the-close-calls-how-false-alarms-triggered-fears-of-nuclear-war/. Schuur, T., et al. "Observations and classification of echoes with the polarimetric WSR-88D radar." Report of the National Severe Storms Laboratory, Norman, OK 73069 (2003): 46. https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.540.9868&rep=rep1&type=pdf Stepanian, Phillip M., et al. "Dual‐polarization radar products for biological applications." Ecosphere 7.11 (2016): e01539. https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/ecs2.1539 Tang, Lin, et al. "A physically based precipitation–nonprecipitation radar echo classifier using polarimetric and environmental data in a real-time national system." Weather and Forecasting 29.5 (2014): 1106-1119. https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/wefo/29/5/waf-d-13-00072_1.xml Zhang, Pengfei, Shun Liu, and Qin Xu. "Identifying Doppler velocity contamination caused by migrating birds. Part I: Feature extraction and quantification." Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology 22.8 (2005): 1105-1113. https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/atot/22/8/jtech1757_1.xml