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Wow, that's terrible. For the birds and for Austinites.
http://www.statesman.com/news/conten..._Shutdown.html
Bird Deaths Shut Down Downtown Austin
By JIM VERTUNO
Associated Press Writer
AUSTIN, Texas — Police shut down 10 blocks of businesses in the heart of downtown early Monday after dozens of birds were found dead in the streets, but officials said preliminary tests showed no dangerous chemicals in the air.
As many as 60 dead pigeons, sparrows and grackles were found overnight along Congress Avenue, a main route through downtown. No human injuries or illnesses were reported.
A closed off stretch of Congress Avenue in downtown Austin, Texas, is shown Monday, Jan 8, 2007. Police closed a 10-block stretch early Monday so officials could conduct environmental tests after several dozen birds were found dead. The carcasses were found overnight. There were no reports of humans harmed. (AP Photo/American-Statesman, Brian K. Diggs)
"We do not feel there is a threat to the public health," said Adolfo Valadez, the medical director for Austin and Travis County Health and Human Services. He said preliminary air-quality tests showed no dangerous chemicals and the area should reopen around noon.
U.S. Department of Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke said officials had no credible information to suggest any imminent threat to the city.
On Congress Avenue, just outside the state Capitol, emergency workers donned yellow hazardous-material suits Monday morning, and dozens of fire trucks and ambulances were parked nearby.
Workers were testing for any sort of environmental contaminant or gas or chlorine leaks that might have cause the bird deaths, said police spokeswoman Toni Chovanetz. At least one bird carcass was being tested locally for other possible causes, and other carcasses were shipped to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Texas A&M University.
Valadez said the tests on the dead birds would likely take several days and look for signs of poisoning or viral infections, though he said officials do not think bird flu is involved.
A 10-block stretch of Congress Avenue, several side streets and all buildings in the area were shut down and declared off-limits as a precaution, Chovanetz said.
The street closure stretched from just outside the Capitol to a section of the Colorado River known as Town Lake. The Capitol opened on schedule Monday, the day before the legislative session was to begin.
On the East Coast, New York City also had a scare Monday morning when a mysterious gas odor moved across Manhattan. It wasn't immediately clear what had caused the odor, and it dissipated fairly quickly. No injuries or damage to wildlife was immediately reported.
Wow, that's terrible. For the birds and for Austinites.
No ...I've got an interview on S. Congress this week. That better not float in the wind.
Does anyone else find it funny they sent birds to A&M for testing instead of UT?
Dead bird!
And I'm gonna put it on you!
Kind of ironic I guess, but A&M does have a big vet school don't they? I'd assume they have facilities to handle that that UT doesn't.
Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's why the birds were sent there.
To go along with this, there's some kind of weird smell in NYC. I'm not sure how like this doesn't seem creepy to people after 9/11. Kinda sad eh?
Mystery odor baffles New Yorkers
New York officials evacuated a number of buildings and shut down some trains after a mysterious gaslike odor was reported today. "One thing we are very confident of, it's not dangerous," New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said at a news conference. The odor was reported as far away as Newark, New Jersey, 10 miles west of the Big Apple
http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/01/08/nyc.odor/index.html
Not really
Even tho I'm a UT fan & alumnus, aTm has an excellent School of Veterinary Sciences that UT doesn't; they're already set up for the analysis
Farm and ranch folks also send soil and water well samples to aTm for analysis because they have a program and the facilities to do it that neither UT nor Texas Tech have
Sounds like a college prank.
It could be a mass suicide.
I know A&M is a great vet school, and being "Agriculture and Mechanical," it makes sense that soil and water samples are sent there... but the irony is what I found funny, not the reasoning.
Think the pigeons all drank the purple Kool-Aid?
Maybe they were all Spurs fans who drank the kool aid after the loss to the Mavs.
That's cool what I find amusing is that all my relatives and neighbors that went to Tech claim that the analysis results are more acurate, and the accompanying recommendations more useful, when they send the samples to aTm than when they use the State Health Dept in Austin
A&M's got a biological research facility that is on the short list for becoming the Homeland Security Department's main biological defense research facility.
Not that big of a surprise, really.
Think the pigeons all drank the purple Kool-Aid?
So it's not Guyana Punch it's Guadalupe Punch?
Too bad it wasn't 6000. That might have put a small dent in the amount of bird crap all over everything in downtown.As many as 60 dead pigeons, sparrows and grackles were found overnight along Congress Avenue
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