Bugs at 12,000ft?

Mavmb

Well-Known Member
When I did that flight with pilot602, one of the things we forgot to mention were those bugs over Roswell, New Mexico!

When the first one hit it the splat was so enormous, that I thought an eagle had deficated on us! Our conversation in the cockpit was, "Was that a bug? At 12000ft? No way that could have been a bug!!!"

Then eventually two more hit. And with the second strikes, we figured than that they must just simply be bugs. And then finally, out of corner of our eye at about one clock we saw a big black dot streaking toward us followed by a huge splat on the winshield! It was even loud when it hit!

Anybody else get hit by a swarm of bugs this high? Furthermore, I'd like to know what kind of bugs they were; they were huge! Parts of New Mexico do have some pretty high elevations, so maybe that's why we encountered bugs that high. Or who knows, we were near Roswell, so maybe it was visitors!
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Men in black come to mind????
 
I've hit bugs as high as 18000 feet.

I was switching my altimeter to 29.92 one morning then whap!

Poor guy was probably trying to set some flying insect record and got axed.
 
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Poor guy was probably trying to set some flying insect record and got axed.

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*LOL*

Wouldn't they get hypoxic above 15,000???
 
I was just thinking, during adverse weather conditions, small GA planes weighing a couple thousand pounds, can get caught in severe updrafts. I wonder as light as bugs are, if some bugs get caught into updrafts and then die because of lack of oxygen!
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Ha, maybe that's a ridiculous theory, but maybe it's true. Then again, maybe no one's ever really thought about it since they're just bugs! Oh well, if true there's one for the animal rights activists!
 
Believe it or not, this is exactly what happens. During college, as an biology elective, I took an Entomology (study of insects) class. A discussion came up about how common insects commonly found in North America were discovered on remote and uninhabited islands. After people started studying this, they found out that insects get caught in updrafts and get caught up in the jetstream, therefore traveling at high altitudes for extremely long distances........ This concludes todays science lesson.
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Did ya make a PIREP
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[/ QUOTE ] Ive heard pilots in Phoenix reporting "a bunch of party ballons out of 5k ft"
 
I saw on the Dicovery channel that there is a breed of microscopic spiders that get caught in updrafts and end up at over 100,00ft, crystalize and are preserved in ice, get caught in the jet stream and end up half way around the world. Then they thaw out and go about their business.

Being microscopic, they probably wouldn't leave much of a splatter though.
 
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Ive heard pilots in Phoenix reporting "a bunch of party ballons out of 5k ft"

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Heard something similar down there too.

<pilot> got some traffic here at my 12 o'clock...
<ATC> uhh...I'm not showing anything sir
<pilot> seems to be a dirigible of some type
<ATC> ...say again?
<pilot> a dirigible
<ATC> d...did you say...dirigible?
<pilot> that's affirm

*shrugs* seemed funny to me. Feel free to proceed to stare at me strangly.
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we hit either a very big bug or maybe a humming bird coming down somewhere around 20,000ft over the western atlantic., big mush on the screen
 
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I was just thinking, during adverse weather conditions, small GA planes weighing a couple thousand pounds, can get caught in severe updrafts. I wonder as light as bugs are, if some bugs get caught into updrafts and then die because of lack of oxygen!

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I've also heard of birds who, like careless GA pilots, cruise on top of a broken layer and then can't get back down through a layer that becomes overcast. It's my understanding that birds don't possess an instrument rating.
 
Probably the weirdest thing is seeing a weather balloon at FL 370. It's just this little blob eerily floating out in the distance then WHOOSH!
 
I've hit 'em at like 6000 or 7000 ft and I thought that was a little high for the little guys. Poor little suckers.

I seen a lot of balloons at altitude here in SoCal too.
 
I'm from Colorado and have done a lot of hiking at high altitude and have seen plenty a bug and bird up at 10, 12, even 14 thousand feet. If people can live at that altitude and acclimate, I'm sure other creatures can too. Just remember, Everest has been summited without suplimental oxygen (29,000+ feet). Insane if you ask me, but its been done.
 
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Just remember, Everest has been summited without suplimental oxygen (29,000+ feet). Insane if you ask me, but its been done.

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Man you have to have a lot of guts to do that. Thats just C-a-Razy if you ask me...think about it...(the C-a-Razy is used from brian fellows on snl...
 
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Just remember, Everest has been summited without suplimental oxygen (29,000+ feet). Insane if you ask me, but its been done.

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Man you have to have a lot of guts to do that. Thats just C-a-Razy if you ask me...think about it...(the C-a-Razy is used from brian fellows on snl... )
 
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I've also heard of birds who, like careless GA pilots, cruise on top of a broken layer and then can't get back down through a layer that becomes overcast. It's my understanding that birds don't possess an instrument rating.

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Those bastards! Alert the FAA!
 
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Just remember, Everest has been summited without suplimental oxygen (29,000+ feet). Insane if you ask me, but its been done.

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Depends on the individual and you wont know until you spend a bunch of time at altitude! I vaguely know several a few people who have done Everest (and other 25K + summits). One did it on with no oxygen (Reinhold Messner was the first in 1978 and he did it again solo in 1980). If you happen to possess the right physiology and you train and acclimatize properly you are a contender for surviving longer up high with no O2. Even still once you are above 25,000’ you have begun the process of dying (even if you are not susceptible to HAPE, HACE, or AMS), but if your body allows you may have enough time to summit and descend safely before crippling effects set in.

Obviously it’s a very serious game.

P.S. Just looked up the stats and as of May 2002, 88 people have done Everest with no O2 support. Over 1600 have reached the summit.
 
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I'm from Colorado and have done a lot of hiking at high altitude and have seen plenty a bug and bird up at 10, 12, even 14 thousand feet. If people can live at that altitude and acclimate, I'm sure other creatures can too. Just remember, Everest has been summited without suplimental oxygen (29,000+ feet). Insane if you ask me, but its been done.



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I think that there may be a difference in the number of bugs that you'll find at 14,000 MSL/0 AGL and 14,000 MSL/13,900 AGL.

I had a boss who like adventure travel and went to the Everest base camp which was at something like 20,000 MSL. One day while walking on one of the trails, he fell, slid down the mountain and broke his leg. He had to be airlifted off by a Nepalese helicopter. After that I had the privilege of telling people that I worked for the only man in Athens GA who fell down Mt. Everest.
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I had read an article in Air & Space about these helos. I think that they mainly use Mi-8s. The main point in the article is that these pilots fly higher than the engineers who built the helos believed that they could go. And they not only fly them way above the absolute service ceiling, they take off and land there.

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Brian Fellows is one of my favorite SNL skits.
 
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