Nidal Issa is a project manager in an environmental consulting office in Champagne. He has been involved in several local nature conservation initiatives and has published over a dozen articles on bird identification, travelling, bird status and birdwatching highlights in national ornithological journals. He coordinated the French bird atlas from 2009 to 2015, and contributed to the national IUCN bird Red List. He also served as a member of the French rarities committee from 2011 to 2015. He usually spends some time on Ushant island in autumn, looking for American and Siberian vagrants among other migrants. He devotes the rest of the year to local birding spots and searching for rare breeding birds, with a specific interest in raptors and black stork.