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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsVultures eat woman's body in 50 minutes after fall off cliff
A woman was eaten by vultures after falling off a cliff in the French Pyrénées, International Business Times reported.
The French woman, whose name has not been released, was hiking Friday in the area with two friends. According to the Times, she attempted a shortcut through the mountain range, located on the border with Spain, but fell off a cliff and died.
The Times reported she died before being eaten by the vultures.
United Press International said she fell about 980 feet. According to UPI, it took the vultures about 50 minutes to eat the 52-year-old's body. They left behind nothing but her bones, clothes and shoes.
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http://news.msn.com/world/vultures-eat-womans-body-in-50-minutes-after-fall-off-cliff?ocid=OBTAP
Junkdrawer
(27,993 posts)We won't destroy the Life on Earth. Life on Earth will eventually find a use for us.
Ikonoklast
(23,973 posts)Humans are not immune from that immutable fact.
Of course it is. We're living things. Just about everything ends up being eaten by something.
AverageJoe90
(10,745 posts)"Foretaste of our fate"? Somebody must've pissed in his Wheaties this morning.....
AverageJoe90
(10,745 posts)Hey, no offense, but that was a totally off-topic and strange thing to say on a thread like this.....
Junkdrawer
(27,993 posts)Tikki
(14,556 posts)a bit with all her forensic claims....not!!!
Tikki
pinto
(106,886 posts)local farmers wanting to hunt them to protect their livestock. Not sure if vultures attack live animals? Thought they generally ate livestock carcasses.
The Times reported that Pyrénéan farmers have been demanding the right to shoot the birds, known as Griffon Vultures, because they've been attacking sheep and cows.
sofa king
(10,857 posts)Last edited Fri May 10, 2013, 12:43 AM - Edit history (1)
(Edit: Apparently one of their first victims was good taste.)
riverwalker
(8,694 posts)DreamGypsy
(2,252 posts)...though perhaps not exactly suited to everyone's taste. Vultures and other carrion eaters perform a valuable function cleaning up dead things...and, as we know, all things that live must die. Rotting carcases are a health hazard; bones, clothes and shoes not so much.
Another excerpt from the article:
But the species is protected in France and has lost access to its normal diet of carcasses due to European health and safety regulations.
That's what happens when a natural balence is disturbed.
randome
(34,845 posts)[hr]
[font color="blue"][center]Stop looking for heroes. BE one.[/center][/font]
[hr]
lunatica
(53,410 posts)Vultures are amazing birds who glide forever on upward heated air currents and who can smell carrion from many miles away. They also seem to have an uncanny way of knowing if an animal or human is dying. I've never seen a picture of a dead one.
Gorgeous vulture! I love vultures anyhow, because we really do need them and other carrion eaters. We'd be up to our necks in dead bodies without the carrion eaters.
Eleanors38
(18,318 posts)Took about 1.5 hours to wrap up a field-dressed deer I shot. I've gotten to where I stay with a downed animal & radio in for a pick up. Damned vultures even buzz me. Thick as hives in this drought, I guess.
KittyWampus
(55,894 posts)so quickly after death.
It's quite profound.
Condolences to her family.
Scootaloo
(25,699 posts)Until that moment, I'm sure it's beyond terrifying.
Let me die without ever noticing... then send in the vultures and hyenas and whatever else wants a bite
Warren DeMontague
(80,708 posts)Except I'd be 105 years old, at home, in bed, surrounded by loved ones, and geeezed to the yammer on pain meds as I slowly drift off into a peaceful narcotic haze.
But other than that, exactly the same. And the vultures are welcome to whatever's left.
dembotoz
(16,799 posts)I see a great video on tosh 2.0 in the making here......
stone vultures flying into walls....
Warren DeMontague
(80,708 posts)but more power to 'em.
dembotoz
(16,799 posts)muriel_volestrangler
(101,295 posts)Diclofenac was banned for veterinary use across south Asia in 2006 after it was discovered to be responsible for catastrophic declines in vulture populations in Pakistan, India, Nepal and Bangladesh, by as much as 99% over 10 years.
The anti-inflammatory treatment was used to treat ailing cattle and other livestock, and when these carcasses were left out for vultures to scavenge, the birds died of kidney failure in their thousands.
As a result, once-common Asian vultures are among the most endangered birds in the world, and the long-billed vulture is one of four Asian species listed as critically endangered by the IUCN.
However a new study by the Peregrine Fund found that by 2008, two years after the ban, breeding populations of the long-billed vulture at study sites in Pakistan had increased by up to 52%.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/oct/30/pakistan-vulture-diclofenac-ban
A particular problem in India, where religion meant that many farmers didn't want to put down sick cattle, but gave them drugs instead. The drop in vulture numbers had the knock on effect of an increase of feral dogs scavenging what the vultures had; which increased the risk of rabies, and also increased the attacks on dogs by leopards - and the attacks on humans by leopards. http://antranik.org/the-great-indian-vulture-crisis/
Jamastiene
(38,187 posts)That is my wish too.
Warren DeMontague
(80,708 posts)care directive.
backscatter712
(26,355 posts)Well, yeah, falling to your death would be pretty terrifying, but then again, people jump off of cliffs on purpose, for bungee jumping and BASE jump parachuting.
I imagine the actual death would be instantaneous.
I agree.
yurbud
(39,405 posts)HughBeaumont
(24,461 posts)You couldn't PAY me to hike so close to giant cliffs or mountains. Other than coasters and the occasional plane, I'm strictly a landlubber.
flamingdem
(39,312 posts)than the having your bones cleaned by vultures part.
Big deal, it's nature.
It's fascinating in a macabre way, I guess, but hopefully she was a nature lover who wouldn't care. I've been trying to decide what to do with my ashes after I am cremated. I wouldn't mind if they were fed to some nice tree.
Myrina
(12,296 posts)Would be really deplorable if people knew she fell but nobody tried to rescue/retrieve her.
Renew Deal
(81,852 posts)The descent through the mountains probably takes a long time and the location where she fell may not be easily accesible.
Myrina
(12,296 posts)Seriously, how did anyone know it was "50 minutes" ?
kestrel91316
(51,666 posts)Art_from_Ark
(27,247 posts)the woman was 53 years old. She fell from the summit of Piste on April 14th, and when the rescue crew arrived around *2 hours later*, they found that vultures had already eaten away her body.
""Nous sommes arrivés sur les lieux en hélicoptère environ deux heures après l'accident, il ne restait que les ossements", a indiqué un secouriste du PGHM présent sur la scène du drame."
http://midi-pyrenees.france3.fr/2013/05/03/pyrenees-les-vautours-auraient-devore-le-corps-d-une-randonneuse-245283.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+France3-MidiPyrenees-Info+%28France+3+-+Info+Midi-Pyrenees%29
Cleita
(75,480 posts)My experience in watching the vultures where I live is that they prefer a corpse that is starting to rot. They actually don't seem to like fresh kill and will wait a day or two for it to marinate if other scavengers don't get there first. If they ate the corpse in fifty minutes, that's pretty understandable. What if she had died first before being thrown off the cliff for the vultures?
Just sayin'.
Scootaloo
(25,699 posts)Old world vultures are predatory; essentially eagles without the killer talons. They're powerful, and turn to predation fairly readily when carrion's not available (Europe's not Africa, there aren't megafauna carcasses littering the landscape, after all). They also form flocks and colonies, which means this woman might have had anywhere from ten to thirty birds working on her
New world vultures are only distantly related to other Accipteridae (and maybe not at all!) They are much more reliant on carrion, having more gracile beaks and weak feet with fairly dull talons. They're opportunists, taking eggs and garbage, but only the black vulture has ever been observed taking live prey. The black vulture is also the only one that makes large groups, and even then mostly for breeding.
Plus, not to be disrespectful, but a 980-foot fall in the mountains is going to loosen the body up more than enough for scavenger birds to strip it.
Cleita
(75,480 posts)what I observe from my feathered neighbors and that has been only in the New World.
MADem
(135,425 posts)I'm thinking about how Europeans prize fresh food now....they're more likely to 'shop daily,' etc.
Terribly inappropriate, I know...
Jamastiene
(38,187 posts)I don't know. I am interested in knowing the answer to that question too. I would guess, and it would only be a guess, they were trying to get to her body taking a safer path than she did and it took 50 minutes? That's just a guess though.
snooper2
(30,151 posts)srican69
(1,426 posts)I would like a sea burial and be fed to fish
tblue
(16,350 posts)Wonder how I'd go about doing that.
Scootaloo
(25,699 posts)petronius
(26,602 posts)into the deep ocean, in a weighted net. (Well actually, I really want to be dressed in a pirate costume and deposited around a corner at my local dive spot, but there might be some objections to that...)
Jamastiene
(38,187 posts)So many laws keep us from deciding what we REALLY want done to our bodies after we die. If a serial killer gets us, especially one who likes to hack up bodies, we have no choice, because serial killers don't follow those laws. But, if we die in a situation where the authorities are involved right away, we still don't get to decide. Out of all the choices we have in NC(burial in a Christian graveyard and cremation), I guess I want cremation. If no one else gets there first, though, let the wildlife live off my body.
Vultures would be the ultimate for my body, because I have always said if reincarnation is real, I wouldn't mind being a vulture in another life. They get to soar like they do, don't have to kill their own food, and nobody wants to capture them to make pets out of them. So, they are truly free, it seems.
I just hope my death is not at the hands of a serial killer. There is one operating in my area, even though the police in my county won't let it be mentioned in the paper. The county next door did allow it to be mentioned and most of the bodies they have found have been in my county.
tblue
(16,350 posts)If you don't mind saying.
Jamastiene
(38,187 posts)Where I live is about 75 miles east of Charlotte and 100 miles south of Raleigh. This serial killer has been operating since at least the mid 90s and nary a word on whether they've made any progress or not. I know the paper in my county will not report on it at all. The county next to us would report on it and I would probably see it online. I haven't seen anything new, so I have no clue whether the county next door has decided to go mum on any information too or what. It's downright creepy knowing our county's newspaper would not report on it when the news first hit.
Cleita
(75,480 posts)don't kill first. Their job is clean up after a kill.
Posteritatis
(18,807 posts)Sure it wasn't a Wall Street skyscraper?
flamingdem
(39,312 posts)new yawkers? occupiers? tourists?
KamaAina
(78,249 posts)Rex
(65,616 posts)vultures ate her was really kinda not needed imo.
CTyankee
(63,901 posts)sipping a cafe cortado, will do me just fine...
HappyMe
(20,277 posts)I'll look at the beauty of the mountains from the safety of a cafe.
Taking off by yourself when hiking in the mountains is a pretty dumbass thing to do.
CTyankee
(63,901 posts)mysterious in late October, very misty, and I thought of the Jews who crossed into
France over them after expulsion in the 15th century, and the Jews who crossed from
France back into Spain after Hitler conquered France in the 20th...
Hassin Bin Sober
(26,324 posts)It's on Netflix instant. Nice little diddy of a movie.
The Way
2010
PG-13
120 minutes
When his son dies while hiking the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage in the Pyrenees, a grieving father decides to complete the 500-mile trek to Spain.
Cast:Martin Sheen, Emilio Estevez, Deborah Kara UngerGenre ramas, Independent Movies, Dramas based on Books, Independent DramasThis movie is:Emotional, Inspiring, Understated
CTyankee
(63,901 posts)thanks for the tip!
flamingdem
(39,312 posts)Imagine not being able to know what's going on in the news in 10 years all because of some dumb mountain climbing expedition. Yay sedentary life!
Just because I'm not inclined to climb a mountain doesn't mean I'm all good with a sedentary life. There are other forms of exercise that don't involve getting eaten by vultures.
flamingdem
(39,312 posts)though I've been known to move now and then
HappyMe
(20,277 posts)I completely misunderstood.
struggle4progress
(118,272 posts)Much of the coverage includes claims vultures are eating live animals and discusses calls for hunting the vultures
Hmmm ...
Jamastiene
(38,187 posts)I have a gut feeling it is a pro hunting blind item...or something like that.
get the red out
(13,461 posts)Nature works that way.
aristocles
(594 posts)"...continuall feare, and danger of violent death; And the life of man, solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short."
nolabear
(41,959 posts)GoCubsGo
(32,078 posts)Vultures are scavengers, and they don't discriminate.
Poll_Blind
(23,864 posts)PB
nolabear
(41,959 posts)I want that on a shirt.
Posteritatis
(18,807 posts)Nevernose
(13,081 posts)Are bad shortcuts through inhospitable terrain characteristically French? Because I used to associate France with an awesome variety of cheese.
Bucky
(53,986 posts)Dont get snarky, he's probably busy trying to figure out how this same incident was a result of Benghazi
datasuspect
(26,591 posts)Blue_Tires
(55,445 posts)Does anyone really give a shit about vulture eating habits?
MFM008
(19,803 posts)I understand the lady was gone after a fall. That is unfortunate. Now before anyone has a rhino, I wouldnt mind the winged clean up crew cleaning up my leavings. It will take them longer than 50 minutes........................
Jamastiene
(38,187 posts)I'm stringy.
Honeycombe8
(37,648 posts)If I'm dead first, I guess that'd be okay with me. That's the way nature keeps itself clean and provides for itself.
MzShellG
(1,047 posts)But seriously, how sad to die that way. Im afraid of heights over that very possibility.
Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)sadbear
(4,340 posts)Simba would be proud.
Liberal_in_LA
(44,397 posts)MrScorpio
(73,630 posts)dimbear
(6,271 posts)Always liked that word.