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posted by martyb on Tuesday August 16 2016, @09:33AM   Printer-friendly
from the buzzy-bunch-needs-new-home dept.

El Reg reports

20,000 [...] bees were found in the exhaust nozzle of an F-22 Raptor engine following flight operations at Joint Base Langley-Eustis, Virginia, on June 11, 2016.

Rather than kill the bees--America is badly affected by hive collapse, the base decided to call on a beekeeper to take them away.

Andy Westrich, US Navy retiree, was the apiarist known to the on-base entomologist (the Air Force keeps insect experts on its bases, apparently). Westrich used vacuum hoses to trap the bees, and he calculated the swarm size from the weight of the captured bees--eight pounds, or in modern numbers, 3.6 kilos.

From the USAF release: "Westrich suspected that the swarm of bees were on their way to a new location to build a hive for their queen. [...] Westrich believes she landed on the F-22 to rest. Honey bees do not leave the queen, so they swarmed around the F-22 and eventually landed there."

wordlessTech has a good photo.


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  • (Score: 3, Informative) by Gravis on Tuesday August 16 2016, @12:19PM

    by Gravis (4596) on Tuesday August 16 2016, @12:19PM (#388649)

    it's not the F-22 that has software problems, it's the F-35 that is a total clusterfuck.

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  • (Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2016, @12:34PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2016, @12:34PM (#388653)

    NEWSFLASH: F-35 not the only military program grounded by bugs, bugs are now also grounding F-22's. Click here for compromising pictures of the Queen Bee. Picture #5 will shock you!
    Reports say Russia is behind the bugs!

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2016, @12:42PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 16 2016, @12:42PM (#388657)

    it's not the F-22 that has software problems

    Umm... yes, it is, or at least was. Example: flight of F-22s over to Japan, onboard systems crashing when passing the date line. That particular one should be fixed now, but...

    • (Score: 2) by tibman on Tuesday August 16 2016, @03:15PM

      by tibman (134) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday August 16 2016, @03:15PM (#388690)

      I remember an issue with the oxygen suddenly turning off and causing pilots to blackout in flight. WTF.

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