I have retold this story on RCSE a long time ago, but here goes again (all 100% true):
The originator of this story had found the Albatross web site and inspired
by it wrote about his time on Midway in an email mr Anderson, heading the
US albatross migration and behavior research project on Some Pacific islands,
including Midway, an island nowadays entirely devoted to the Gooney Birds,
as the military and USAF eventually left. Another effect of the Detente!
One day two young soldiers, in their 4x4 truck, were cruising along a road on
Midway,
at the regulated 20 mph - as not to harm the birds that tend to set up camp just
anywhere, like on runways and roads. Our friend, lets call him Bill, sat idly
looking out on the hundreds of albatrosses that littered the runways, taxiways
and whatnots. Suddenly, just as they passed it, a youngster began running beside
the truck, parallell to the road they were travelling on, totally concentrated
at the task ahead - to get airborne!
Oblivious of the big truck and the two men inside it, our Mr Gooney now began to
flap his wings more forcefully, running faster and faster and eventually was
airborne. Bill, who always lhad had a soft spot for the big birds, had silently
been
urging the bird on, hoping that it would succeed and now, overjoyed, he couldn't
keep
quiet, so he blurted out something like:
'Hooray! That's the way to do it, mate!'
This had an unforseen conseqence, as mr Gooney startled by the cry, now noticed
Bill and the truck for the first time, and turned his head in utter amazement
to study those queer creatures inside that moving thing, while flying along at the
at truckriders' eyelevel - just a wingspan away from the truck. A lovely sight,
no doubt!
The story could have ended here, but didn't, or in another way really did, as
the truck was reaching the end of the road, which crossed one of the runways,
so there was this big sign with the letters 'S-T-O-P' on it.
Well, mr Gooney, of a long line of Gooneys, now showed a blatant disregard of
traffic rules, as he didn't heed the sign till to late, or he maybe argued -
very logically and obviously correctly, in some respects, that as a bird
in flight traffic signs didn't apply, or possibly he could not yet read,
being less than a year old, or just missed the sign, as he was still staring
at the two humans in the truck.
As fate would have it, mr Gooney came to an abrupt stop, from 20 mph to nil
in less than half a wingspan -ouch! We will never know if Mr Gooney
really intended to disregard the stop sign, or not.
As it was, Mr Gooney fell to the ground, ungracefully, lost from this world for
a short while - birds brains are not as delicate as many a mammal brain -
probably dreaming of yet to come grand flights across the Pacific.
Bill and his friend had stopped the truck, of course, being a) able to read;
b) lawabiding persons; c) eager to see in what would happen next; d) saw the sign;
e) all four above.
Eventually, Mr Gooney - of the long line of Gooneys that had inhabited Midway
since the last iceage, stood up, rearranged his long, delicate wings into a
semblance of order, and then took a long and concentrated look at the sign,
before he began the long tiring and humilating treck back to the other end
of the road, where Mum and Dad, and all the relatives were standing or roosting,
to maybe try a new attempt later that day, or maybe wait till the sign falls down.
They all do, eventually!
Tord,
Sweden
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