[random][geek] Snarge?

Yup, snarge: the bloody glop left behind when a bird and a plane try to share the same physical space. Evidently, there are labs that specialize in ID-ing these smears to help pilots avoid catastrophe; the Smithsonian Instition's Feather Identification Laboratory gets a dozen or so snarge samples from the FAA and US military every day. Who knew? Who also knew that sometimes, things aren't quite what they seem in this world of bird-goo? From the above article:

And its not just birds. Sometimes jet-stream encounters can take a page from the X-Files. "We've had frogs, turtles, snakes. We had a cat once that was struck at some high altitude," said the Smithsonian's [head of the Feather Identification Laboratory, Carla] Dove. She says birds like hawks and herons will occasionally drop their quarries into oncoming planes. "The other day we had a bird strike. We sent the sample to the DNA lab and it came back as rabbit. How do you explain to the FAA that we had a rabbit strike at 1,800 feet?"

Yick. Snarge. Now you know. Isn't your world a better place now?