Birdwatchers see rare white-throated needletail fly into turbine on Harris [View all]

[caraher]

I had the Fox News version of this story forwarded to me by my sister, who got it from my wind turbine-hating cousin.

Apart from the fact that, however awful it surely was for UK birdwatchers to witness this freak accident, the death of any single bird scarcely measures up against the many entire bird species threatened not just with random death but extinction by fossil fuel use, describing the bird in the headline as "rare" is ridiculous spin. The bird is rare in the UK:

The white-throated needletail, which breeds in Asia and winters in Australasia, was spotted on Harris.

At least the BBC piece ends with this comment from a bird conservation group:

A spokeswoman said: "Whilst the collision of this unusual visitor with a small domestic wind turbine is very unfortunate, incidents of this sort are really very rare.

"Careful choice of location and design of wind farms and turbines prevents, as much as possible, such occurrences happening on a large scale."

She added: "Wind energy makes a vital contribution towards mitigating the impacts of climate change, which is the biggest threat to our native birds and wildlife."

The FOX version offers no perspective, to nobody's surprise...