Turtles Cause Airport Chaos! Follow FizzicsEd Articles: Comments 0 (photo from the New York Port Authority) This is my favourite news story of the week. Earlier this week I wrote about flight delays caused by Volcanic Ash closing airspace above South America, New Zealand and Australia. This is much more fun – flights were delayed at JFK Airport in New York City by Diamondback Terrapin Turtles who had found their way onto the runway. There is a large population of Terrapin Turtles living in the marshes near JFK Airport, and every year they migrate to nearby sandy areas in Jamaica Bay to lay their eggs – and there just happens to be a runway in the way. A runway at a very, very busy airport. The runway was closed for a few hours while biologists worked to relocate the turtles to safety. This population is declining because the eggs they lay are often snatched up by racoons, leaving very few youngsters. Other issues such as pollution from the NY sewer system are also causing the population to decline. Conservation biologists closely monitor populations such as these because they provide a good indicator of the health of the wetland that they live in. This is probably going to happen several times over the next month or so as the rest of the population seeks to lay their eggs. There have been several plans drawn up that may encourage the turtles to avoid the runway in future – but this has been occurring since the 1940s, and I seriously doubt that it will be easy to teach these old turtles new tricks. Love Science? Subscribe! Join our newsletter Receive more lesson plans and fun science ideas. PROGRAMS COURSES SHOP SCIENCE PARTIES Calendar of Events HIGH SCHOOL Science@Home 4-Week Membership 12PM: March 2024 Feb 26, 2024 - Mar 29, 2024 12PM - 12PM Price: $50 - $900 Book Now! PRIMARY Science@Home 4-Week Membership 2PM: March 2024 Feb 26, 2024 - Mar 22, 2024 2PM - 2PM Price: $50 - $900 Book Now! Light and Colour Online Workshop, Jan 18 PM Jan 18, 2024 2PM - 3PM Price: $50 Book Now! Light and Colour Online Workshop, Jan 18 AM Jan 18, 2024 9AM - 11AM Price: $50 Book Now! Lego Robotics, Sydney Olympic Park Jan 2024 Jan 24, 2024 9AM - 12PM Price: $50 Book Now! Creative Coding, Sydney Olympic Park Jan 2024 Jan 24, 2024 1PM - 4PM Price: $50 Book Now! Creative Coding, Sydney Olympic Park July 11 2023 Jul 11, 2023 9AM - 4PM Price: $100 Book Now! Fizzics Education STEAM Day: Robots vs Dinosaurs, Lalor, Apr 14 Apr 14, 2023 9AM - 12PM Price: $45 - $50 Book Now! Creative Coding, Sydney Olympic Park April 14 2023 Apr 14, 2023 9AM - 4PM Price: $100 Book Now! Science@Home After School 4-Week Membership: March 2023 Mar 06, 2023 - Mar 31, 2023 4PM - 5PM Price: $40 - $1200 Book Now! Featured Articles Up, up and away! Topics Churchill Fellowship [19] Gaming [7] Ozscied [2] Teaching [263] Chemistry [5] International [1] Photography [1] Play [1] numeracy [1] Cleveland [1] Gifted [7] Podcasts [119] Television [2] design thinking [8] Chinese student visits [1] Parenting [4] preservice teaching [5] Club [4] History [4] Pop Culture [4] Toys & Gadgets [1] project-based learning [5] Science & Technology Camps [1] Lesson ideas [1] Comedy [2] Coding [14] Indigenous [3] Preschool [24] Video Conferencing [40] family [2] Design [2] Lab Tech [1] math [1] Cooking [3] Kids [36] Remote Education [16] Virtual Excursions [9] Inclusive education [6] Oceans [5] Leadership [1] Electricity [1] Dinosaurs [7] Kids Parties [5] Robotics [10] Edutech [26] Classroom management [1] video conference [1] special needs [1] scholarship [1] Apps [11] Distance Education [50] Kitchen Chemistry [7] Safety [2] Distance Learning [19] Student encouragement [2] online [4] image [1] Africa [1] Agriculture [4] Eastershow [2] Maker Space [11] Scicomm [141] primary education [46] STEAM [9] virtual [2] gamification [1] Asia Pacific [1] Art [17] Edchat [223] Maths [14] Scied [34] literacy [7] Higher education [4] Child online safety [1] Esports [1] Easter [1] Augmented Reality [4] Edtech [68] Media [18] Science [6] secondary education [44] teacher [1] dis [0] biotechnology [1] curriculum [2] AussieED [1] Education [208] Museums [31] Science News [4] Christmas [1] Vacation care [1] Film [1] computational thinking [2] high [1] Awards [13] Educhange [5] Music [2] Social Media [8] experiments [6] middle school [2] Inquiry-based learning [5] digital technologies [5] Earth science [1] Big History [1] Environment [37] NASA [6] Soils [1] seasonal [1] Artificial Intelligence [3] List [1] Games [1] Medicine [1] Biology [43] Events [45] National Science Week [3] Space Science [29] competitions [12] Sustainability [8] Student investigation [2] Social Emotional Learning [1] CAST test [1] Books [3] Farming [1] Outdoors [36] Sport [8] careers [10] UN SDGs [4] collaboration [1] Engineering [4] US Education [1] China [1] Food [4] Outreach [35] STEM [219] Physics [6] Global [2] K to 2 education [1] Virtual reality [2] citizen science [1] Load More Topics
(photo from the New York Port Authority) This is my favourite news story of the week. Earlier this week I wrote about flight delays caused by Volcanic Ash closing airspace above South America, New Zealand and Australia. This is much more fun – flights were delayed at JFK Airport in New York City by Diamondback Terrapin Turtles who had found their way onto the runway. There is a large population of Terrapin Turtles living in the marshes near JFK Airport, and every year they migrate to nearby sandy areas in Jamaica Bay to lay their eggs – and there just happens to be a runway in the way. A runway at a very, very busy airport. The runway was closed for a few hours while biologists worked to relocate the turtles to safety. This population is declining because the eggs they lay are often snatched up by racoons, leaving very few youngsters. Other issues such as pollution from the NY sewer system are also causing the population to decline. Conservation biologists closely monitor populations such as these because they provide a good indicator of the health of the wetland that they live in. This is probably going to happen several times over the next month or so as the rest of the population seeks to lay their eggs. There have been several plans drawn up that may encourage the turtles to avoid the runway in future – but this has been occurring since the 1940s, and I seriously doubt that it will be easy to teach these old turtles new tricks.
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