Germany: Young falcon rescued from Nordsee Ost substation

A saker falcon called Rocket has just experienced some eventful days. After flying roughly 300 kilometres from the Berlebeck Eagle Station in the Teutoburg Forest, the exhausted bird landed on the substation of the Nordsee Ost offshore wind farm. There the bird was found by RWE wind farm service engineers who took him to Heligoland on board of a crew vessel. The falcon was nursed back to health at the ornithological station on the North Sea island before falconer Benjamin Aschmann took him back home.

“I’m very glad that Rocket came out of his first adventure so well and that I received the bird back in such a healthy and chirpy condition,” explains Benjamin Aschmann of the Berlebeck Eagle Station. “At twelve weeks, Rocket is still a very young animal. He was flying freely with eight other falcons at our station. Rocket must have underestimated the thermals and then lost his orientation. That’s the only way I can explain how he flew so far out into the North Sea.”

“There the exhausted bird made an emergency landing on our substation,” adds Ilja Rakoniewski, Senior Offshore Technician at RWE Innogy. “We then discovered the falcon high up on a cable tray. At first, we didn’t know how we were supposed to catch him. We tried luring him with a meatball, but he wasn’t interested. Then we contacted the ornithological station on Heligoland and with a few tips from the experts we were able to catch Rocket and place him in the care of the ornithologists.”

Falconer Benjamin Aschmann & Dr. Jochen Dierschke, Head of ornithological station on Heligoland