Date:         Tue, 2 Oct 2001 19:53:45 -0400
Reply-To:     Pat Sully <prsully@BELLSOUTH.NET>
Sender:       Georgia Birders Online <GABO-L@LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
From:         Pat Sully <prsully@BELLSOUTH.NET>
Subject:      Re: Whooping Cranes
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="Windows-1252"

I received this information from  another listserv and wanted to share the
message with my other friends, YOU!

Pat S.

> Subject: re:whooping cranes
>
>
> > Whooping cranes were grounded by FAA restrictions
> >
> >  by Jenny Price
> >  The Associated Press
> >
> >  Flight restrictions federal aviation officials
> > imposed following
> > terrorist
> >  attacks in New York and Washington did not just halt
> > commercial air
> > travel
> >  and strand travelers worldwide. They also temporarily
> > grounded a group
> > of
> >  nine whooping cranes in Wisconsin getting ready to
> > fly south for
> > winter.
> >
> >  Researchers with the nonprofit group Operation
> > Migration are hoping to
> >  establish the nation's second migratory flock of the
> > endangered birds
> > by
> >  leading the cranes with an ultralight aircraft in
> > October to the
> >  Chassahowitzka National Wildlife Refuge in central
> > Florida.
> >
> >  To build up their endurance for the journey, the
> > cranes have been
> > taking to
> >  the skies over the Necedah National Wildlife Refuge
> > since July, led by
> > the
> >  ultralight.
> >
> >  The birds' training flights were halted Sept. 11 when
> > the Federal
> > Aviation
> >  Administration grounded aircraft that use visual
> > flight rules, which
> > allow
> >  small aircraft to fly with little contact with air
> > traffic
> > controllers.
> >
> >  Since the attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade
> > Center, the FAA had
> >  allowed only instrument-rated pilots who file flight
> > plans with
> > airports to
> >  fly.
> >
> >  But the cranes resumed their training flights Friday
> > after the
> > government
> >  reopened the nation's rural airspace to small planes,
> > including the
> >  ultralights used to train the whooping cranes.
> >
> >  "They flew really beautifully this morning,''
> > Operation Migration
> > pilot
> > Deke
> >  Clark said after taking the cranes for an 8-minute
> > flight Saturday
> > morning.
> >
> >  The birds, which hatched in May from eggs at the
> > Patuxent Wildlife
> > Research
> >  Center in Laurel, Md., exercise daily to build their
> > strength so they
> > can
> >  follow the ultralight, as they would their parents,
> > on a predetermined
> > route
> >  south.
> >
> >  "If this (the FAA restrictions) went on for about
> > two, two-and-a-half
> > weeks,
> >  it would have been very difficult to make it all come
> > together,''
> > Clark
> >  said.
> >
> >  Beth Goodman, with the state Department of Natural
> > Resources
> > endangered
> >  resources program, said officials were considering
> > writing letters and
> >  making telephone calls to win an exemption from the
> > FAA for the crane
> >  migration project before officials lifted the
> > restrictions.
> >
> >  "If we had lost a fair amount of time, or the project
> > would have
> > ended,
> > that
> >  would have been very sad,'' Goodman said.
> >
> >  Goodman and Clark said the birds won't leave right on
> > schedule, but
> > there's
> >  still time to make up their missed training so they
> > can leave for
> > Florida
> > by
> >  mid-October.
> >
> >  "I'd just as soon not fly in the snow,'' said Clark,
> > a retired
> > military and
> >  commercial airline pilot.
> >
> >  The cranes started their training when the sound of
> > an ultralight
> > engine
> > was
> >  played to them while they were still in the eggs.
> >
> >  The whooping cranes will follow the same route south
> > that 11 sandhill
> > cranes
> >  from the Necedah refuge following an ultralight took
> > last October. The
> >  sandhill cranes made the return trip on their own
> > last spring.
> >
> >  Whooping cranes, named for their loud mating call,
> > were thought to
> > number
> >  between 700 and 1,400 in North America before
> > unregulated hunting and
> >  habitat destruction brought them close to extinction
> > in the 1940s.
> >
> >  About 400 whooping cranes exist in the world, with
> > 188 of them
> > migratory.
> > >>
> >
> >
> > Troy Ettel
> > State Ornithologist
> > Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency
> > P.O. Box 40747
> > Nashville, TN 37204
> >
> > (615) 781-6653
> > tettel@mail.state.tn.us