Fishin' on the flightline

Published June 17, 2014
By Airman 1st Class Janelle Patiño
92nd Air Refueling Wing Public Affairs

FAIRCHILD AIR FORCE BASE, Wash. -- An unusual occurrence happened on Fairchild, June 17, when a 92nd Operations Support Squadron Airman found a Koi fish lying on the flightline.

The team was doing their daily airfield inspection to ensure safety on the flightline when Senior Airman Mary Olesky, the 92nd OSS airfield management shift lead, spotted the fish.

"We were inspecting the entire runway when I saw a bright orange object and thought it was a piece of a construction cone," she said. "When I went near it and saw it was a fish, I immediately picked it up and put it in a bag thinking it was dead already."

When Olesky showed it to the airfield manager, the fish suddenly started breathing again.

"When we saw it breathe again, I immediately ran into the kitchen to put water in the bag," she said. "I was pretty surprised to see it alive, knowing it had been on the flightline."

Finding a fish on the flightline doesn't always happen and having found it alive is pretty amazing, she said. Before deciding to keep the fish, Olesky will contact the veterinarian on base to make sure the fish is safe.

"If we can save him, we will buy him a fish tank and keep him in our office," Olesky said. "We will be naming him Fod, aka Foreign Object Damage."

There are several theories as to how Fod got to the flightline and according the Master Sgt. Joel Jones, the 92nd Air Refueling Wing flight safety Senior NCO, any bigger birds might have dropped it on the flightline.

"To name a few, the Blue Heron or Offspring birds are common in this area," he said. "One of those might have picked it up from someone's pond and decided to drop it off on our flightline."