LONG FLIGHT

The Bird With the World’s Longest Migration

The Arctic tern’s migration is longer than twice the Earth’s circumference.

The Arctic tern weighs only about four ounces. Hopefully that makes it easier for it to fly its annual route, which is a little more than twice the distance around the Earth.

Scientists have known for a while now that this tiny bird, native to the U.K.’s Farne Islands, makes the longest migration of any creature on Earth. But last year a group of researchers at Newcastle University fitted 29 of them with tracking devices, and found that their commute was even longer than they’d thought.

The birds traveled almost 60,000 miles. They left the Farne Islands in July, reached South Africa in August, spent October in the Indian Ocean, arrived in Antarctica in March, and then finally made their way back home to the Farnes in April.

Over the course of its lifetime, one Arctic tern typically travels about 1.86 million miles—the equivalent of about four round trips to the moon.

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Nathan Place

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