750 African Grey parrots perished on a 1Time airlines flight from Johannesburg’s OR Tambo airport to Durban’s King Shaka Airport on Christmas Eve.

The parrots had been captured in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and were transported to South Africa for resale as pets in the second stage of a three-part transaction of a larger group of parrots.

Ben Moodie, a well-respected Boksburg lawyer, alleges the birds were to be imported for his business Iceland Industrial Projects. He said he was only informed of the birds’ fate on December 29.

“At the OR Tambo quarantine the birds were fine and I was informed that on arrival at King Shaka they were dead. I can understand a few casualties along the route, it happens. (But) this doesn’t gel and I can only satisfy myself if they show me the carcasses,” a distraught Moodie told The Witness.

Yeah, you go ahead and satisfy yourself all over those carcasses, guy. I never thought I would live to see the words, “well-respected”, “Boksburg”, and “lawyer” used in conjunction for the description of a singular entity.

Anyhow, it’s a crazy, crazy world.

1Time are obviously a little tense about the situation. Their defense is that a small dog in the same hold as the parrots survived the flight. I have to say I’m surprised they didn’t pull out the “They’re just pining for the Congo” line.

The rest of the story is a little bit FUBR – there’s a lot of he said/she said going on there.

One thing is of course for sure – these are ex parrots.

In the interim, could someone please inform 1Time that standard practice is to punch air holes in boxes intended for animal transportation?

[Source : News24]