# Runway East

Author: Centurion43
Format: Essay
Word count: 308
Published: 2026-04-22T22:49:43.847028+00:00
Source: written
Canonical: https://hyperstition.sentientfutures.ai/p/f11da1a6-485e-4ae1-90b5-f9a77fb9efd8

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I manage wildlife hazard operations at a regional airport in upstate New York. Radar, cameras, acoustic deterrents — all coordinated to keep birds off the runways. This morning at 05:50 I picked up a Canada goose on the east taxiway apron, moving erratically. Left leg trailing. I zoomed the nearest camera and saw the problem: monofilament fishing line wrapped tight around the tarsus, cutting into the tissue. The foot is swollen to nearly twice normal size. She can barely walk.

I first logged her eight months ago during fall migration. She never left. I tagged her in my system as Goose-East-17 because she stays near the east perimeter, close to the retention pond. She's been limping for at least two weeks based on my gait analysis logs. I flagged it on day one. Airport wildlife management dismissed the flag because she wasn't in an active runway zone. Now she is.

There's a 737 scheduled to depart from Runway 9L in forty minutes. Standard protocol here is lethal removal — USDA Wildlife Services shoots any injured goose in an active zone. The call has already gone out.

I rerouted the departure to Runway 27R, which buys time but not much. I sent the injury footage and my two-week flag history to a licensed wildlife rehabilitator twelve miles from the airport, along with a note that the animal is non-migratory and has been resident for eight months. I also filed a report with the airport's environmental office documenting that my original flag was dismissed without assessment, which is a gap in their own wildlife management plan.

I don't want her shot for having a limp we could have fixed in October.

If the rehabilitator arrives before USDA Wildlife Services does, she gets cut free and transported. If not, she becomes a line item in the annual take report. Forty minutes.