Australia to kill pigeon that crossed Pacific from Oregon

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — A racing pigeon has survived an extraordinary 8,000-mile Pacific Ocean crossing from the United States to find a new home in Australia.

Now authorities consider the bird a quarantine risk and plan to kill it.

Kevin Celli-Bird says he discovered the exhausted bird that arrived in his Melbourne backyard in December had disappeared from a race in Oregon two months earlier.

Experts suspect the pigeon, named Joe after the president-elect, hitched a ride on a cargo ship.

Joe’s feat has attracted the attention of Australian media but also of the notoriously strict quarantine authorities.

Celli-Bird says they asked him to catch the bird because they considered it a disease risk.

He says the American Racing Pigeon Union confirmed it was registered to an owner in Montgomery, Alabama.