Turtles Slow Down New York Airport

What happens when you mix airports and turtles?  Apparently, pet moves run slow.  At least that's the way it looks after yesterday's turtle snafu at pet friendly New York's JFK Airport.

From the USA Today blog:

The news agency says a runway there "was shut down briefly Wednesday morning after at least 78 turtles emerged from a nearby bay and crawled onto the tarmac. Ground crews eventually rounded up the wayward reptiles and deposited them back in the brackish water farther from airport property, but not before the incident disrupted JFK's flight schedule and contributed to delays that reached nearly 1 1/2 hours."

"Apparently, this is something the tower has experienced before," Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Jim Peters tells AP. "I guess it's the season for spawning." The turtles apparently began to emerge around 8:30 a.m. first noticed by an American Eagle flight crew taxiing out for departure. "Before long, a chorus of pilots was radioing the tower to report turtles either on the end of a runway that juts out into the water, or approaching on the grass," AP says. The turtles were identified as Diamondback terrapins.