Bug Bombers

Adventures of the Mosquito Air Force

There is an air war being waged in south Florida. Nearly every morning through the hottest months of the year, pilots brief before dawn, climb into their warbirds, and take off on low-level bombing missions that hit the enemy where he lives. This enemy is insidious, persistent, and never gives up. He has nature on his side. But we have science on ours. And air power.

Among old-time Floridians, stories persist of mythical mosquitoes big enough to carry off small children, of mosquito hordes thick as swarming locusts, of mosquito-infested summers so miserable that just stepping outside was an act of will, if not downright courage. Florida may be a paradise for vacationers, snowbirds, retirees, and the like, but it's also mosquito heaven. With its hot, damp weather, ample rainfall, and innumerable low-lying flat areas for standing water to accumulate, summertime Florida is a veritable incubator for the syringe-wielding pests of the insect world. These infamous carriers of yellow fever and malaria may not be the health threat they once were, but they sure know how to put a damper on the old barbecue or turn the attendees at a Fourth of July fireworks display into their own movable feast.

When I moved to Venice, Florida, a year or so ago, I was surprised at first that the mosquitoes weren't as bad as you'd expect in the subtropics. Then I noticed the Sarasota County tank-truck crews that regularly spray every accessible culvert and mud puddle that might serve as a love nest for procreating skeeters. I soon realized that a Florida without mosquitoes is a lot like green lawns in Las Vegas, less a natural perk of residing in the area than an example of better living through science.

The key word when you talk about the ubiquitous tank trucks, though, is "accessible." Sure, they use motorboats and air boats, too, but in these parts — as in much of the state — if you can't reach the mosquitoes by some sort of earthbound conveyance, they are pretty much left alone. That leaves a lot of real estate in which the little bloodsuckers are free to blissfully breed.

Which brings us, as pilots, to the truly interesting — and fun — part of the Florida mosquito wars.

In Lee County, back in the 1960s, the folks charged with mosquito control realized that you could never really win the battle against the tiny vermin strictly through a land campaign. This called for air superiority. The solution? A fleet of 800-gallon spray-tank-equipped bug bombers that could comb the county at treetop level, fogging the nasty little buggers in their soggy breeding grounds.

The program has been a great success. Today, Lee County Mosquito Control operates a fleet of seven DC-3s, six UH-1 Huey helicopters, four turbine Bell 47s, and two Bell JetRangers in its ongoing air war. They're based, appropriately enough, at a former World War II bomber base just outside Fort Myers. It is by far the largest mosquito-control aviation program in the state.

Face it: Every pilot loves the DC-3. And every pilot worth his A-2 jacket enjoys low-level flying — when it's conducted safely and legally, of course. Who among us could avoid getting jazzed up about a fleet of old Gooney Birds that earn their keep flying 130 knots at an altitude of about 75 feet?

Photographer Winston Luzier and I arrived at Buckingham Field in the predawn darkness. The security guard let us through the gate and escorted us to the pilots' lounge, where the coffee was already on. Out on the ramp, the unmistakable shapes of DC-3s loomed in the gloom, looking ghostlike at that eerie hour. The flight crews soon trickled in, some dressed in snazzy blue flight suits, others in simple work shirts and pants like those a car mechanic would wear.

Each DC-3 carries a pilot and copilot, and there would be three aircraft flying today's missions. Chief Pilot Charlie Morrison, who would fly the JetRanger camera platform for the photos that accompany this article, met us in the lounge, and introductions were made as we headed for the briefing room.

The briefing is conducted by the mission leader, and Morrison rotates that duty among all the pilots. Today, 17-year veteran Jack McCauley handles the briefing, discussing departure and rendezvous procedures and going over the locations to be fogged. Two ships will spray the area around Sanibel and Captiva islands; another will work alone on the mainland. Morrison, Luzier, and I will follow the two-ship formation as it works Sanibel, then join the single aircraft a few minutes away. The pilots follow McCauley's briefing on photocopied maps, and it's all wrapped up in short order. They've done this before.

As light starts to gather on the flat eastern horizon, the pilots preflight their airplanes, start them, and warm the big radial engines. ("You don't start a DC-3 engine," one says. "You wake it up.") The airplanes depart one after another, and soon we are airborne in the JetRanger as battleship-gray light illuminates the field just before sun-up.

From the air, the place really does look like an active military base, with the Hueys and remaining DC-3s parked in neat rows on the huge apron. The Buckingham runways are painted on what used to be the parking area for the B-24s and B-17s that were based here. The old grass runways have long since grown over, although concrete touchdown pads remain. After a brief, low-level flight over absolutely lovely scenery (already I envy these guys their jobs), we reach Sanibel, where the two DC-3s now are at work. You might think that the well-heeled residents of this exclusive resort community would get miffed by big, old airplanes roaring over their rooftops at the crack of dawn, covering their handsome homes with insecticide-laced clouds. But Morrison says he gets few complaints. It seems the good citizens prefer the airplanes to flying pests of a much smaller variety.

The airplanes cover the designated area in back-and-forth swaths, flying in staggered formation. (As many as six DC-3s may spray at once.) They lay down a highly visible mixture of insecticide and oil smoke, emitted from "fogging pots" fixed to the airplanes' exhaust stacks. The pots were designed by T. Wayne Miller, the father of the Lee County Mosquito Control program who retired last year. They work a lot like airshow smoke systems, and in fact the diesel-like oil mixed with the insecticide is the same stuff used in airshows. (The bug juice is called Baytex, and its active ingredient is Fenthion.) The oil smoke helps the chemical settle and also helps the pilots keep track of where they're spraying. This is strictly an eyeball operation, although an experimental new procedure calls for laying insecticide only in an ultra-low-volume, virtually invisible mist, with GPS used to keep track of where you've been and where you're going.

The "thermal fogging" is a beautiful sight to behold (unless you're a mosquito), with the low light of sunrise illuminating the big smoke trails and the old airplanes swooping gracefully into slow crop-duster turns at the end of each swath. (Missions are flown only at dawn, when the calm air makes for smooth runs and even settling of the chemical.) Wingtip vortices form little wisps in the edges of the cloud as it settles into the trees.

After a while, we join the solo airplane on the mainland run and land in a small clearing for some ground-to-air photos. There is little warning as the DC-3 appears at the treetops and — vrooom — disappears just as quickly. We take Morrison's word that the fog is harmless to humans as it settles over us and, yup, it smells just like airshow smoke. (The pilots get tested every six months for toxicity. None has yet come out with high levels of insecticide in his bloodstream.)

After an hour or so, we return to Buckingham — the DC-3s passing us on the way in. Liability concerns have prevented us from going along on an actual mission, despite signing the obligatory release forms, but Morrison has a treat in store. Pilot Gene Sutton will take Luzier and me out in one of the DC-3s to show us how it's done. We won't be bombing any bugs, but we'll fly the same patterns at the same altitudes over some unpopulated terrain, while copilot trainee Glenn Crocker gets a familiarization flight in the bargain.

These DC-3s are nearly all ex-military. (To be technically precise, there are actually five military C-47s, one civilian DC-3, and a military C-117 "Super DC-3," although they're all "DC-3s" to most of us. The Bell 47s are Soloy turbine conversions; and the Hueys are Bell UH-1Bs and UH-1Hs, though the -Bs soon will be replaced by six newly-acquired surplus -Hs from Fairbanks, Alaska.) What with the martial surroundings, the predawn firing of big radial engines, and the stripped Army-green interiors of the DC-3s, you can't help having flashbacks to all those war movies you saw as a kid. By the time you're airborne, these fantasies swing into full gear. Soon you're seated behind Ted Lawson in Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo, hedge-hopping in his B-25 Mitchell along with the rest of Doolittle's Raiders.

Just as you're switching into the Dam Busters mode, you snap back to reality when you notice that the wingtips seem to be in the trees during the turns. "Uh, how much clearance do you allow between the wings and the trees in those turns?" I sheepishly ask Sutton over the intercom. "Enough, I guess," comes his laconic reply. Sutton, who flew Hueys in Vietnam, has been doing this for 10 years and they've never lost a DC-3.

There are seven full-time pilots employed year-round by Lee County Mosquito Control, although most of the flying happens in the summer, when mosquito romance is in the air. In addition, 12 part-time copilots work on a seasonal basis. Minimum qualifications for pilots are 1,000 hours in airplanes and 1,000 hours in helicopters, although most have a lot more time than that. All the full-time pilots are qualified to fly every aircraft in the fleet. Pilots come from the wide spectrum of general aviation — Sutton, for example, instructed in airplanes after his wartime flying, while Morrison flew helicopters for the sheriff's department — and most tend to stay on board once they're hired.

"It's the job of a lifetime," says Sutton. "I like flying the DC-3s." While he allows that it can sometimes get boring, flying the same areas over and over again, it's still enjoyable. "A lot of other guys have Learjet and airline time," he says, acknowledging that he has chosen a less-traveled path for a career pilot. "But a lot of those guys would like to fly the DC-3."

"There's a lot of nostalgia to it .... It's great to be able to fly something that's had such a long and useful life in aviation," says Morrison. "The airplane flies well. It's stable. A real pilot's airplane .... It's a stick-and-rudder, seat-of-the-pants airplane."

There's more to the job than being able to handle a DC-3, however. Lee County isn't laid out with nice, neat parallel streets or section lines. Pilots have to be aware of where they are — and where any ground obstacles are — while watching for traffic and delivering even fog patterns. They have to be experienced enough that they don't need to spend all their time thinking about flying the airplane.

"It takes a certain kind of pilot to do the low-level work," Morrison says. "It seems to be appealing to everybody, but some people just can't do it day after day after day and still be comfortable with it."

William L. Gruber, a former AOPA Pilot staff editor, is a freelance writer living in mosquito-free Venice, Florida.