Turtle Brigade Delays Flights at J.F.K.
Dozens of turtles, presumably on a mating spree, shut down a runway at John F. Kennedy International Airport Wednesday morning for 35 minutes, causing flight delays of an hour and a half.
The 78 diamondback terrapins were picked up, put into a pickup truck and removed from the runway, said John Kelly, a spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
They were originally spotted around 8:30 a.m. by a pilot, who radioed the tower. “It’s not unprecedented, but it’s not at all common,” he said.
