The Aussie Bird That Outflies an Airbus A380
- Gregory Andrews
- 1 day ago
- 3 min read
I first encountered Bar-tailed Godwits on Lord Howe Island. Later, I watched them again near Broome, probing mudflats with their long bills, seemingly calm and unhurried. I couldn’t stop thinking that I was looking at one of the world’s greatest endurance athletes.
The Bar-tailed Godwit looks like a relatively unassuming shorebird. Brown and grey mottled feathers. Long legs. Long bill. Nothing about it screams “superhero”. But every year these birds undertake one of the most extraordinary migrations in the natural world. Bar-tailed Godwits fly more than 13,000 kilometres non-stop from the top to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean - from Alaska or Siberia all the way home to Australia and New Zealand. No landing. No sleep in the conventional sense. No food or water breaks. Just days and days of continuous flight over open ocean.
That’s roughly the same distance that an Airbus A380 might fly on a long-haul international route. Except the Godwit does it powered by fat reserves and evolutionary brilliance.
What fascinates me most is the psychology of it - if we can use that word for a bird. On the journey north, many Godwits stop along the Yellow Sea mudflats between China and the Korean Peninsula to feed and refuel before continuing on to Arctic breeding grounds in Siberia and Alaska. But on the way south, many simply keep going. As if they are so determined to get home to Australia and New Zealand that they bypass the stopovers entirely and launch into one immense transoceanic flight.
Scientists have found that before their migrations Bar-tailed Godwits dramatically reshape their bodies. They gorge themselves until nearly half their bodyweight is fat. Their digestive organs shrink during flight to save weight and energy. Their wings and aerodynamic form become living engineering marvels.
And yet, despite these astonishing feats, Bar-tailed Godwits are under growing pressure.
Climate change is altering wind systems, weather patterns and Arctic breeding habitats. Sea-level rise threatens their coastal wetlands. But perhaps most critically, the destruction and reclamation of mudflats around the Yellow Sea is removing the refuelling stations they depend on during their northward migrations. Massive areas of tidal habitat have already been lost to ports, seawalls, industry and urban development. Imagine trying to fly from Sydney to Los Angeles knowing the only airport halfway across the Pacific had been bulldozed. That’s essentially what these birds have to deal with.
The Bar-tailed Godwit reminds me that conservation isn’t just local. Protecting Australian wildlife means protecting global ecological systems and migratory pathways. These birds connect Siberia, China, Korea, Alaska, Australia and New Zealand into one living story. And there’s something special about that.
Every year, without maps or GPS, Bar-tailed Godwits navigate hemispheres, storms and oceans to return to the same coastlines and mudflats. They’ve been doing it for thousands of years. Long before airports. Long before nation states. Long before humans understood what migration even was.
And now their future depends largely on whether the world can restrain its appetite for endless coastal development and fossil fuel-driven climate disruption. For me, the Bar-tailed Godwit is a reminder that some of the greatest wonders on Earth aren’t loud or flashy. Sometimes they are quiet birds on a mudflat near Broome or Shanghai, preparing to do something almost unimaginable.
