Oil rigs may provide bird buffet for sharks

[XemaSab]

Heaped on a table at the laboratory, the pile of beaks, feet, eyeballs, feathers and whole bird carcasses testified to what may be the oil industry’s most unexpected environmental impact.

For the second year in a row, researchers at the Dauphin Island Sea Lab have found the remnants of migratory birds in the bellies of tiger sharks caught off Alabama.

The body parts provide compelling evidence of the mortal toll that oil platforms take on birds migrating across the Gulf of Mexico each year. The carcasses also highlight an issue federal officials have essentially ignored since it was revealed seven years ago.

A federal study from 2005 described a phenomenon known as “nocturnal circulation.” Groups of birds migrating across the Gulf on cloudy nights can be disoriented by the brightly lit oil platforms and fly around them in circles for hours, often until they become exhausted and fall into the sea and die.

http://blog.al.com/live/2012/01/oil_rigs_may_provide_bird_buff_2.html

[xchrom]

1. du rec. nt

[Bob Wallace]

2. I wonder if this problem could be eliminated...

or at least greatly reduced by switching to downward pointed LEDs on motion detector/IR switches?

They might be able to cut unnecessary lighting to a low enough level to not confuse the birds.

Radar can light things up if a vessel moves into the area.

--
On a different, but similar topic there is technology being installed to allow wind turbines to 'go dark' unless an aircraft approaches on a collision route. If this approach works out then turbines, communication towers and other stuff sticking up in the air wouldn't need to blink all night long.

(There's a fail-safe mode in which the flashing lights start up if there's a problem with the radar system.)

[OKIsItJustMe]

3. I wonder how this toll would be affected if wind turbines were there, instead of oil rigs