Team of Super Vultures Deployed in Peru to Battle Polluters
“Outfitted with GoPros & solar-powered GPS trackers, the crew of carrion-loving vigilantes is sniffing out illegal dumps in Lima.
They may be the unlikeliest heroes put to work in the name of the environment, but there they are. Captain Huggin, Captain Phoenix, Captain Aella & a crew of 7 more trained black vultures (Coragyps atratus) that have been tasked with doing what they do best: sniffing out rubbage.
... this high-tech team patrols the skies of Lima, Peru on the lookout for illegal trash disposal.
...Dan Collyns explains in The Guardian that the city of 10 million people has just 4 landfills…& countless illegal dumps... ‘Run-off from the waste contaminates Lima’s main water source, the Rimac river, as well as with the Chillon & Lurin rivers, which flow into the bay of Lima.’ With 8,000 tons of trash created a day, it’s really quite a mess.
So what to do? Send in the vultures. The project is called “Gallinazo Avisa” (Vultures Warn) & is a joint collaboration between the U.S. Agency for International Development & Peru’s Ministry of Environment...While vultures may have a notoriously creepy reputation, they are nonetheless an important part of ecosystems across the planet – their ability to handle bacteria & their taste for decay makes them great comrades in helping get rid of waste & to help stop the spread of disease...
So armed with GoPros & solar-powered GPS trackers... the Peruvian kettle* of vultures soars above the city; the images they capture are streamed back to headquarters & any illegal dumps they discover are logged, explains Smithsonian Magazine...
...The whole project has a great PR component to it – people can even track the vultures’ flights with an online map... It brings great awareness to the problems of waste disposal, & ...helps advance the cause of an otherwise maligned bird that could really use some respect...
*...The term kettle means a groups of vultures in flight. Committee, volt, or venue refer to vultures resting in trees. Wake is used for a group of vultures that are feeding.
Melissa Breyer
Feb.8/2016
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