Birds are dying in record numbers this autumn by flying full-speed into Big Apple buildings, lured to their deaths by glassy skyscrapers — with the sleek Battery Park City corridor among the city’s biggest death traps.
There are almost 1,000 known cases of migratory birds obliviously smashing headfirst into the mirage-like reflective buildings since August — a whopping 53% increase from last year’s strike toll.
But experts warn the vast majority of bird strikes go uncounted — as unusually high winds and low clouds this year had the migrating flocks flying faster and at lower altitudes than normal.
“Fall of this year has been really hard,” Dr. Dustin Partridge, NYC Bird Alliance’s director of conservation and science, told The Post Tuesday.
“We’re still waiting on a little bit of the data to come in, but based on the data that we currently have, we’re already approaching record numbers of birds collided.”
The reflection of the glassy skyscrapers — which seemingly blend into the sky — has plagued migrating birds for decades, but this autumn’s weather patterns may be to blame for the skyrocketing number of collisions, experts said.
The wind and low-cloud ceiling pushed an estimated 25 million migrating birds directly into high-risk areas, including a particularly deadly skyscraper hotspot along lower Manhattan’s Hudson River coastline.
As many as 50 struck birds landed in Rockefeller and Teardrop Parks in 2024 alone, with another 100 smashing into the sparkling One World Trade Center and neighboring Brookfield Place, according to dBird, a crowd-sourced data tracker for the tragedy.
“It’s upsetting. We keep building glass towers, so it keeps happening, which is really awful,” said Regina Overath, a horticulturist with Battery Park City Authority, who plucks dozens of dead birds off the ground of the neighborhood each migration season.
Overath and her team members bury the unfortunate victims in the coastal park’s garden bed, but try to care for surviving birds until they are well enough to fly away.
“I wish these buildings — the glass towers — would do something to prevent the birds from flying into them, because the birds can’t see,” Overath explained.
One Battery City resident told The Post he notices about one dozen dead birds littering his street each year, and has even experienced the birds smashing into his waterfront window.
“They’re all dead — I mean, these are pretty tall buildings,” said Konstantin Shakhnovich, 49. “And I only tend to notice because my dog tends to investigate.”
With the migration season still days away from ending, the NYC Bird Alliance confirmed that nearly 1,000 birds have flown into buildings during this year’s ominously dubbed “collision season” compared to 600 last year.
The 1,000 birds from this fall were counted by the 160 volunteers combing through 16 routes across the Big Apple as part of the organization’s Project Safe Flight.
But the volunteers can only cover so much ground, and so many of the birds are scooped up by cleaning crews without documentation, while others are gobbled up by large predators like rats.
Additionally, up to 60% of the so-called surviving birds tend to succumb to their devastating injuries within the same day of the collision — making the potential death toll harder for experts to pin down.
Shiny, glass-covered buildings have emerged as some of the city’s most deadly for birds, according to the data that does exist.
Nearly 40 birds have flown directly into the towering Deutsche Bank Center at Columbus Circle this year, with another 10 documented as colliding with the 11-story apartment building that overlooks Central Park — though locals say the toll is much higher.
Edrick Randheen, the superintendent for a neighboring block, told The Post he has witnessed nearly two dozen dead birds this fall at the base of the Circa Central Park, a curved, glass residential building that for years has proven to be a death trap for birds.
“It’s on both sides, but mostly the park side because the glass reflects the park. The birds think it’s the park and that they’re flying into the trees, but it’s glass,” said Randheen, 50.
“When they fly into it, they’re basically breaking their neck instantly.”
Robin Becker, a private chef for one of the Circa residents, told The Post that some units in the building have put decals in their windows to mitigate the slaughter, but the problem has persisted this autumn.
The solution of replacing the windows with expensive bird-safe glass has been raised, creating a new issue for the residents: to hurt their pockets or hurt the birds.
“People are upset that the birds are still getting there. They’re upset about the birds getting hurt. They’re also upset about the price. I think they’re just not sure what to do,” said Becker, 53.
