They’re Set for Battle, but It Won’t Bee Soon : Public safety: Special county unit is keeping an eye out--and weapons ready--for arrival of feared insects.

They call themselves the “B” team.

They are Orange County’s first line of defense against the dreaded and much-ballyhooed Africanized honeybee. But the specially equipped swat team from the Orange County Vector Control District has encountered one major problem since it was formed eight months ago: no killer bees.

After undergoing special training to combat the ferocious pests, the original five-person team has dwindled to three, with two of the remaining trio often pulling rat and mosquito extermination duty. Two of the team’s five new trucks designed to annihilate the bees have been put in mothballs.

But as much as the squad would like to think the feared swarms are afraid to set their hairy legs in Orange County, the fact is the Africanized honeybees are just moving slower than anticipated, experts say. Originally, the bees were supposed to arrive last spring; now local experts say it will be more like next spring.

“Sure, I’m disappointed they aren’t here yet,” said Danny McCarty, a reassigned “B” teamer who will return as a substitute once the killer bees show up. “I think the public is happy they aren’t here yet. But we are waiting for the real thing.”

In the meantime, the county unit has been training on swarms of the more docile European bee. Last week, two members attacked a colony of some 40,000 bees that had nested near the Orange Freeway and Yorba Linda Boulevard.

Mission accomplished. But it didn’t come without cost.

“Yeah, I got stung a few times,” said Dennis Loughner, supervisor of the county’s Africanized honeybee program. “Sometimes they sting through the veil.”

Bees also can sting through the team’s cotton suits. But when the killer bees begin buzzing by, the team probably will start wearing two protective suits at once.

A key to victory, team members realize, is to study their enemy. Accordingly, they have immersed themselves in killer bee literature, which chronicles the hybrid insects’ slow migration from Brazil since 1957.

The research has shown that while although killer bees are nothing to ignore, they aren’t exactly the lethal menace once thought to be.

“All the public hears is the horror stories,” Loughner said. “And that all the bees are going to be killers and such.” The sting of the Africanized honeybee really isn’t any more venomous than that of his European cousin, but the newcomers attack in far greater numbers. Besides, he said, “we still need them to pollinate the trees and flowers.”

He added, “And you can take protective measures.”

The team’s first weapon is a pack they carry on their backs that’s powered by a hand pump and sprays a bee-suffocating soapy solution. If that doesn’t work, they go to “the power sprayer.”

A hose-like device bolted onto their trucks, the sprayer holds 50 gallons of the solution and can fire 45 feet vertically and 65 feet horizontally.

“If we get them stirred up and they start getting out of control,” Loughner said, “we can knock them down with this.”

But the team has developed a healthy respect for their foe. After all, a swarm of killer bees has been known to sting a victim up to 4,000 times.

“I’m a little apprehensive,” Loughner said. “If it’s a swarm, I just hope we handle it efficiently.”

It shouldn’t be too long before they discover how they will perform in combat. The bees crossed into Riverside County earlier this month.

Even though he is only a substitute, McCarty is eager to be the first to bag a killer bee. McCarty’s co-workers say if his track record is any indication, the Vietnam War veteran probably will do it.

The team has created its own competitions, and McCarty keeps coming out on top. The squad recently honored the Garden Grove resident as its first “ace” for killing 10 bee swarms. No less a distinction, however, is McCarty’s certificate for being the first team member to get stung.

“Oh, it definitely hurt,” he said.

Since the Africanized and European bees look so much alike, it’s very possible the “B” team won’t know it has slain its nemesis for a week or so. After they wipe out a swarm, a sampling is sent to the lab for weeklong tests to identify the species.

“We actually might be shocked to find out they’re Africanized,” Loughner said.