MIAMI BEACH, Fla. – Video shows a blackbird dive-bombing into a woman who was pushing a stroller with a baby in Miami Beach. She wasn’t the only passerby the birds have targeted.
Videos show the birds were fast enough to strike a man while he was riding a scooter on Arthur Godfrey Road, and another who was riding a bicycle.
Miami Beach resident Brenda Klein, who recorded the videos, said a bird struck her last week. She avoided the comparisons to Alfred Hitchcock’s horror film “The Birds.”
“It’s just like out of nowhere and it’s so scary. You don’t know what hit you,” Klein said.
Miami Beach officials said boat-tail grackles, large songbirds with rounded crowns and long legs, are the culprits. The passerine birds are nesting on the palm trees that line up along 41st Street, between Alton Road and Palm Drive.
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, grackles can attack people and pets when they perceive a threat to nests or young, and minor injuries to people have been documented.
Klein and Ana Livingston, of the Bubbly Boutique, said pedestrians in the area should be careful because they have heard of some minor injuries.
The city code designates the area as a bird sanctuary. Officials said they have to follow federal law to deal with the perching birds humanely.
A city spokesperson released a statement on Wednesday afternoon saying they have contracted industry professionals to handle the matter and installed new signage to alert pedestrians.
“We take this matter and the safety of our residents very seriously,” the spokesperson wrote.
LOCATION