News
You dirty rat!: helicopters to the rescue in the U.K.
December 9, 2014 By The Oxford Mail
Dec. 9, 2014, Oxford, U.K. - Two helicopter engineers are flying to a remote Atlantic island to lend their expertise to the world’s largest rat cull.
Paul Wilkinson and Sam Carr, who work for A2B Heli at Oxford Airport,
will fly over South Georgia dropping some 95 tonnes of rat poison across
the island.
The expedition is part of an international effort led by Dundee
University to wipe out the Norwegian Brown Rat, which is decimating the
island’s bird population.
The rats, left by whaling ships hundreds of years ago, have made
several species all but extinct on South Georgia by taking their eggs.
A helicopter poison drop last year, which Bicester father-of-three Mr
Wilkinson took part in, seems to have eradicated rats in the northern
half of the island.
This year, he and a team of 15 conservationists and engineers hope to
finish the job in the southern half, covering an area of 364 sq km.
Mr Wilkinson said: “It is an amazing place, just spectacular.
“Once you get used to not having toilets and showers, and the fact the
food is a bit rubbish, and it is long days and cold, you just go
exploring.
“It is a bit of adventure.”
When he sets off on January 18, he will leave behind partner Sarah Day
and their children Charlotte, 10, Alice, nine, and five-year-old
Matthew, all pupils at Bicester’s Kings Meadow Primary School, for three
months.
