Eagle release to honor Lancasters, benefit Anchor Point family Part 1

A couple weeks ago, Cindy asked if I would help out doing an Eagle release in Anchor Point with Todd Boren, one of our Eagle presenters. (He also writes a blog called Petra's Adventures). The release is a memorial to our friends Leslie and Morgan who were killed in a car accident last November. The event also is a fund-raiser for the John and Linda Stevens, good friends of the Leslie and Morgan. John was diagnosed with cancer about 4 months ago.

Well you know my answer was "Yes". So my son Ryan and I went out to the flight center on Thanksgiving morning to catch BE 07-35. It had came to Bird TLC back in August from Homer for failure to survive. It was fresh from the nest. We took it to the clinic for an over night stay.

On Friday morning I met up with Todd at Bird TLC. We loaded up #35 and Petra and headed to Homer with Todd's wife Linda, where we spent the night. We met up with John and Linda and she told us countless stories about Leslie and Morgan. She also told us more on Petra's history. Petra was caretaken and presented by Leslie. Linda presented Sybil, a Snowy Owl caretaken by Leslie also. The weather outside was terrible. Heavy rain and high winds. We were concerned about the release.

The next morning we had the pleasure of having coffee with Jean Keene, the Eagle Lady in Homer. That was a blast. She is one neat lady and at 84 she is just getting along just fine. She gave Petra some herring to have for dinner later on. As you can see in the pictures the weather was fine, partially sunny and 35°.

From there we headed to the release site, not far from Linda & John's home in Anchor Point. Still no rain but you could see evidence of the heavy rain and slight flooding from yesterday. It was a little windy and chilly, but we saw an Eagle fly by so we figured if it didn't mind it #35 wouldn't either.

There was a good turn out. People came from Anchorage, friends from nearby, the Homer News, and just people who heard it on the radio or red it in the news.

Part 2 in a couple days.......

Click on pic's to enlarge