FLIGHT safety at the Sunyani Airport risks being compromised unless urgent measures are taken to control the increasing colony of bats at the University of Energy and Natural Resources (UENR), managers of the Ghana Airports Company Limited (GACL) have said.

According to airport officials, the cauldron of bats frequently flies across the airport’s airspace, posing a major risk to aircraft operating in and out of the facility.

Bats threaten flight safety at Sunyani Airport

“When the bats swarm around the airport, they interfere with aircraft movement and make landings particularly difficult,” a source at the airport told The Ghanaian Times on condition of anonymity in Sunyani yesterday.

The source said the situation had become a growing concern for both pilots and ground staff, explaining that the bats often invade areas around grounded aircraft, including the tyres, engine compartments and fuselage, thereby increasing the risk of flight disruptions and potential damage.

The Sunyani Airport, which was originally constructed in the early 1960s and recently refurbished and reopened in 2022, is located southwest of the UENR campus — a stone’s throw from the bat colony’s habitat.

When contacted, the Head of the Department of Ecotourism at UENR, Dr Wereko-Gyebi, confirmed the issue, noting that a meeting was recently held between officials of the GACL and the university’s management to discuss the matter.

As a temporary measure, Dr Wereko-Gyebi said the university had stationed staff from its Ecotourism Department at the Sunyani Airport to assist in inspecting aircraft that land there to ensure no bats are hidden within any part of the planes before take-off.

Despite the nuisance, he said, the university continues to use the bats for academic and research purposes.

Residents from nearby communities reportedly visit the campus to hunt the bats for food, often throwing stones into the trees — actions that have, at times, resulted in the breaking of vehicle windscreens belonging to university staff and lecturers.

A university source further told The Ghanaian Times that there were long-term plans to relocate the bats to a safer and more suitable habitat.

This, the source said, would follow broad stakeholder consultations involving the Wildlife Division, the Bono Regional Coordinating Council and the university’s management.

Meanwhile, Norman Cooper reports from Accra that when contacted for his comment on the matter, a former pilot of the Ghana Armed Forces, Wing Commander Kwaku Kekrebesi, said bats, by their nature, hibernate in the day and move about at night, and therefore might not pose any danger to flights that operate during the day.

“Unless it is the case that the Sunyani Airport operates at night, the matter of safety or interference with flights would not be a reality,” he said.

With respect to bird strikes — the presence of birds around airports during the day, the former pilot explained that the Civil Aviation Authority usually deployed devices that emit high-frequency sounds, a type of noise that deters birds from the area to ensure the safety of flights and passengers.

Wg Cdr Kekrebesi further advised that to prevent birds and animals from coming close to airport facilities, authorities must remove ponds or materials within the immediate environs that are likely to attract them.

However, wildlife experts have cautioned that any relocation effort must be handled carefully to avoid ecological imbalance or potential sanctions from conservation authorities.