When Jaws meets the Cows!
July 14, 2023
Plan of Action for the Conservation and Management of Sharks & Rays in Portugal
July 18, 2023
Remember when we moved some East Atlantic Sally Lightfoot Crabs from the Azores to Houston??
Our friends from Houston Zoo were so delighted to welcome these strange little critters that they asked us for more and we were equally delighted to collect, pack, and ship them.
However, things did not go very smoothly this time!
The first flight, from the Azores to Lisbon, went flawlessly and landed on time.
The second flight, from Lisbon to Frankfurt, is when things went a little awry, because the plane departed and our friends from Lufthansa called our freight-agent to let him know that the two boxes with our crabs were left on the ground.
“WTF?!” he replied, as did we when we heard the news minutes later.
We were then educated about the fact that Lufthansa had implemented an embargo on all AVI (live animals) shipments due to the heat, to which we replied “And you didn’t think of bringing that up during the two weeks of exchanging paperwork that we just shared, including approvals from Lufthansa in Lisbon, Frankfurt and Houston??”
This is the point where we would normally say “Ok, we’ll go pick up the boxes from the airport and let’s reschedule.” but, this time, knowing full well how these animals are supremely well packed by our crack-team of Azorean professionals, we replied “Well, I’m sorry to say this is your f#ck-up, so it’s your mess to deal with.” and hung up the phone. Politely.
There.
We’d never done that before but, at some point, people need to be accountable for their actions.
And they were.
Within an hour we heard back from Lufthansa, who apologized and placed the crabs on the next flight to Frankfurt. Sadly they missed their connection to Houston, which forced them to endure an extra 24 hours of transit time, bringing their journey to a total of 80 (!) hours.
But, guess what?
At the end of such an ordeal, there were zero losses and all crabs arrived to their destination doing just fine, thanks to our professional packing job.
Sometimes our clients complain that we use too much water in our bags and they’re “paying for shipping water”. That may be true, but these are the moments that conservative approach pays off. Because, in the end, this business is not about making money or saving money, but ensuring the animals we pull from the wild absolutely benefit from the best care available.
Because, if they’re going to help our public aquaria friends tell a story about the oceans and the perils they are facing, the least we can do is spare no effort in ensuring their journey is as pleasant as it can possibly be, despite these little SNAFUs.
