Longest ever human-assisted migration a success and paves the way for an ultralight-led migration flight with endangered Whooping cranes in 2001

After departing central Wisconsin on October 3rd the team traveled 40-days and 1250 miles, leading 11 Sandhill cranes in a "dress rehearsal" flight to the St. Martins Marsh Aquatic Preserve on the west coast of Florida - arriving on the 11th day of the eleventh month with eleven cranes.

Three and a half months later, on Feb. 25th, 10 of the cranes departed the preserve, heading north and for sixty days remained at large.  On April 27th the call we had been waiting for arrived - 10 Sandhill cranes had just been confirmed on the grass training strip at the Necedah NWR where they had taken their first flights with the ultralight aircraft the previous summer!

The team will now prepare to fly the same route identified during the Sandhill crane flight - with Whooping cranes in 2001!