More Than 1,000 Dead Birds Plunge From Sky in Arkansas

[one_voice]

BEEBE, Ark. -- Wildlife officials are trying to determine what caused more than 1,000 blackbirds to die and fall from the sky over an Arkansas town.

The Arkansas Game and Fish Commission said Saturday that it began receiving reports about the dead birds about 11:30 p.m. the previous night. The birds fell over a 1-mile area of Beebe, and an aerial survey indicated that no other dead birds were found outside of that area.

Commission ornithologist Karen Rowe said the birds showed physical trauma, and she speculated that "the flock could have been hit by lightning or high-altitude hail."

The commission said that New Year's Eve revelers shooting off fireworks in the area could have startled the birds from their roost and caused them to die from stress.

*snip*

http://www.aolnews.com/2011/01/02/more-than-1-000-dead-birds-fall-from-sky-in-arkansas/?icid=maing%7Cmain5%7Cdl1%7Csec2_lnk1%7C34186


This is kinda creepy. :scared:

[madfloridian]

1. I just saw that it is up to 4 or 5 thousand now. Link....

Will look for the link...CNN International I think.

Found it

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/US/01/02/arkansas.falling.birds/?hpt=C2

"As of Saturday, between 4,000 and 5,000 blackbirds had been found dead, said Keith Stephens with the commission.

"Shortly after I arrived, there were still birds falling from the sky," said commission wildlife officer Robby King in the statement. He said he collected about 65 dead birds."

[one_voice]

6. Wow..this is bizarre...

end of the world type stuff.

[BrklynLiberal]

2. Whatever the cause...it is very sad, and I wonder if they will ever tell what the TRUE cause was.

[virgogal]

4. Maybe they'll never know what the true cause was.

[madfloridian]

3. They are red-winged blackbirds, beautiful birds.

So sad.

[elocs]

5. Read about it here this morning:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4680166

[one_voice]

7. My bad...

I looked but didn't see it.

[gristy]

8. The reporter states that they were all dead before they hit the ground

but gives us no reason as to how or why he comes to that conclusion. This is just bad reporting.

[The Wielding Truth]

9. Remember the birds that fell out of the sky in Austin?

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-427997/Dead-birds-rain-towns-half-world-apart.html

"Dead birds rain down on towns half a world apart"

Last updated at 22:00 10 January 2007


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-427997/Dead-birds-rain-towns-half-world-apart.html#ixzz19vUnTlRX

[sarcasmo]

10. Part of the plot from the TV show Flash Forward.

[RubyDuby in GA]

11. That's exactly what I thought and they cancelled it so we don't know how it ends.

[sarcasmo]

12. Just a bit creepy.

[one_voice]

13. OMG...you're right...

I watched that show for a while. I totally forgot that.

[sarcasmo]

15. Remember they put two and two together and realized it was the epicenter of the flash.

[SpiralHawk]

14. Also a Massive fish kill in Arkansas today...wow

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=4680823&mesg_id=4680823

Massive fish kill blankets Arkansas River

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Source: CNN

(CNN) -- Arkansas officials are investigating the death of an estimated 100,000 fish in the state's northwest and suspect disease was to blame, a state spokesman said Sunday.

Dead drum fish floated in the water and lined the banks of a 20-mile stretch of the Arkansas River near Ozark, about 125 miles northwest of Little Rock, said Keith Stephens of the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission. A tugboat operator discovered the fish kill Friday night, and fisheries officials collected some of the dying animals to conduct tests.

Stephens said fish kills occur every year, but the size of the latest one is unusual, and suggested some sort of disease was to blame.

"The fish kill only affected one species of fish," he said. "If it was from a pollutant, it would have affected all of the fish, not just drum fish."

Ozark is about 125 west of the town of Beebe, where game wardens are trying to find out why up to 5,000 blackbirds fell from the sky just before midnight New Year's Eve.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/01/02/arkansas.fish.kill /