- Note - The following note is from Geologist
and earthquake expert Jim Berkland and deals with the totally bizarre disappearance
of 2,000 racing pigeons and how that might be linked to a very large, pending
earthquake. Jim will discuss this alarming development with Jeff Thursday
evening, 10-8-98, at 7 PM Pacific.
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- Posted by Jim Berkland, 10-7-98, on his
website <www.syzygyjob.com:
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- Folks,
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- Daniel Karnes posted a significant news
item on the Animals Page about 90% of thousands of racing pigeons dropping
out in two separate races on Monday back East. They say they have never
seen anything like it and can't explain it by solar flares or bad weather.
Another explanation is magnetic field changes prior to large earthquakes.
I have established this quite well by working since the early 1980's with
Nick Corini, pigeonmaster in Hollister, CA.
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- You can read about it in a chapter dealing
largely with my work in the 1996 book, CALIFORNIA FAULT, by Thurston Clarke
(Chapter titled "Lost Cats and smashed Pigeons."
-
- A Smash Race is one where few of the
birds get back on time or do not return at all, Corini has records of Bay
Area pigeon races going back decades, and he spent some time researching
the greatest smash race in local history. The date caused me to gasp. It
was March 24, 1964, which I knew was just 3 days before the greatest quake
measured for North America, the 8.5M Richter (9.2Mw Moment magnitude) Alaskan
Quake on Good Friday, 1964. It struck in the late afternoon on the day
of a Full Moon!
-
- It had been preceded by a few months
of strange slowing of Old Faithful Geyser in Yellowstone. In recent months
we have had a similar report about Old Faithful.
-
- I have had several unconfirmed reports
of the Federal Scientists being concerned about a large US quake this fall.
I don't know if that is true, but I do know that I am concerned, and this
amazing coincidence of Smash pigeon races does not ease my mind. I am trying
to learn if other parts of the world have experienced similar "smash"
races.
-
- (Note - The 1964 'smash' race occurred
over 1600 miles from the location of the Alaska quake. Jim Berkland states
that the location of the smash race may have little to do with the epicenter
of any following quake...that the magnetic disturbance caused by fault
stress is so powerful it can disrupt the internal magnetic guidance systems
of pigeons great distances away.)
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- Homing Pigeons Vanish En Route
10-7-98
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-
-
- (AP) Some 2,500 homing pigeons disappeared
during two long-distance races on the same day, a nearly unheard-of loss
in the little-known sport of pigeon racing.
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- About 1,800 pigeons vanished out of 2,000
competing in a 200-mile race from northern Virginia to Allentown on Monday.
The same day, 700 out of 800 birds never returned to their lofts in a separate
150-mile race from western Pennsylvania to Philadelphia.
-
- The birds remained unaccounted for Tuesday
night. Ordinarily, the swift-flying birds should have been back in their
lofts in a matter of hours.
-
- "I've never seen anything like this,"
says Earl Hottle of Allentown, who has been racing pigeons for 37 years.
"Nobody can explain it."
-
- Pigeon racing has thrived for centuries
among a devoted group of several hundred breeders in the mid-Atlantic states.
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- Each weekend in spring and fall, thousands
of pigeons are trucked up to 600 miles away and released. Relying on their
homing instinct and incredible stamina, the pigeons fly directly to their
lofts. The ones with the fastest times are the winners.
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- In any race, a small percentage of the
birds do not return home -- but a 90 percent loss rate is unusual.
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- "We've heard of this in other areas,"
says Jim Effting, who had only three of 37 birds return in the race from
Virginia. "But we've never had it happen around here."
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- Racing veterans have few ideas about
what caused the birds to lose their way -- or otherwise disappear. There
were no weather problems during either race, sun spot activity was low
and no comets, meteor showers or planet alignments occurred. The skies
were clear of satellite interference.
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- "The chances that 2,000 hawks would
get 2,000 pigeons are pretty unlikely," says racer Dennis Gaugler.
"The birds would scatter when attacked."
-
- "The truth is that nobody knows
what happened," says another racer, Robert Costagliola, "and
probably never will."
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