London - Thousands of homing pigeons could be flying around hopelessly lost and unable to find their way home because of the supersonic airliner Concorde. A California-based scientist, Jon Hagstrum, argues that shock waves from the aircraft may throw the birds off course and prevent them from hearing low-frequency sound that helps them to navigate, New Scientist magazine said yesterday.
He suspects that Concorde caused a third of 60,000 birds taking part in four races between France and England in 1997 to lose their way.