During the celebration for New Year’s 2011 thousands of blackbirds in central Arkansas were spooked from their roost and died in Beebe, Arkan. and now police in the area have reported a similar incident for the areas 2012 celebrations.
According to local police a ban was placed on the shooting off of fireworks last night after dozens of blackbirds fell dead from the blasts.
While it wasn’t immediately clear if the fireworks were to blame a police officer said of the cities decision:
“We started shutting down fireworks,” and “We’re working on cleaning up the birds now.”
Scientists studying the phenomenon say the loud bangs, booms and cracks of fireworks exploding likely send the birds into such a state that they begin flying around and crashing into large objects including homes, care and even other birds, causing them to become unconscious and plummet to their death or die immediately upon impact.
Joking about the incident Beebe’s police chief Beebe’s police chief told the Associated Press people sit on their front porches to watch it occur: “I guess we could have an annual blackbird watch,” he said with a laugh. “People can just bring their umbrellas.”
In another case a resident who slept through last years strange even said they slept through it last year but made sure to stay awake in case it happened again this year.
[Image via ShutterStock.com ]
