A massive heat wave caused at least 100,000 bats in Australia to fall from flight and tumble to their deaths.
The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals spokesperson Michael Beatty told the Australian Broadcasting Company that the extreme weather created "a catastrophe for all the bat colonies in southeast Queensland," adding that temperatures in the area climbed to nearly 109 degrees Fahrenheit.
A rainfall of winged mammals descended from the sky at 25 different colonies, ABC reported, leading to mass deaths of bats in the various areas, which Beatty said will create issues for other animals as well.
Beatty told ABC that the fallen bats will "have a pretty disturbing impact on those colonies, and those colonies are vital to our ecosystem."
Conservation worker Louise Saunders described the event as a "horrible, cruel way to die," in an interview with the Telegraph.
"Anything over 43 degrees [Celsius] and they just fall," she stated. "We're just picking up those that are just not coping and are humanely euthanizing what we can."
The Queensland health department publicized a statement written by Chief Health Officer Dr. Jeannette Young that gave residents specific instructions on how to handle the some-hundred thousand corpses strewn about the area.
"If you find a bat, it is very important not to touch it because of the risk of infection with Australian bat lyssavirus," Young wrote, referring to a kind of rabies. "Some bats may appear dead by they are not, and when people have attempted to remove them they have been bitten or scratched."
One YouTube user videotaped a group of bats that had fallen in a nearby forest. In the 2 minute spot, the narrator recorded hundreds of deceased bats both on the ground and in trees.
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