For the first time, a flamingo was noticed walking on the road in Navi Mumbai, and unfortunately, a few of them died after being hit by vehicles on the service road off Palm Beach road in the wee hours of Friday.
“We noticed one bird rolling and trying to stand on the service road off Palm Beach at NRI signal and tried to rescue it,” said a 22-year-old cinematographer and bird lover, Hamraj Khurana. After a while, the bird collapsed and died, he said. He alerted the NRI police which kept the bird aside as nobody else could be contacted at that time. This is a case of a hit-and-run, and the CCTV camera in the vicinity ought to have recorded the incident, which occurred around 1.45 am, he said.
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Khurana noticed another flamingo walking on Palm Beach road. “Around four flamingos were walking on the road and they were not looking in good condition. One of them died in front of me,” he said. Former corporator Bharat Jadhav also posted a video showing two dead flamingos in the Seawoods NRI area.
Flamingo Spotted Walking on Navi Mumbai Road:
It is bizarre that the flamingos came out of their wetland habitat and landed on the road, NatConnect Foundation director B N Kumar said and called for an investigation by the environment department.
Dr Rahul Khot, deputy director of BNHS, said this was the first time that he heard about flamingos landing on the road. They could have got disoriented or exhausted, he said and observed that this calls for a follow-up.
Meanwhile, Kumar said the DPS Flamingo Lake is totally dry and few birds which land there could be struggling to get food. The NRI wetland is dirty and hardly any flamingos land there. “We observe thousands of flamingos landing at TS Chanakya wetland during the high tide in Thane Creek Flamingo Sanctuary (TCFS) and hundreds of bird lovers thronging the area ,” he said.
NatConnect has once again appealed to Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC) to press with CIDCO for handing over the DPS Flamingo Lake and saving biodiversity.