Updates from our Cuckoos

Although we are continuing to receive updates from Charles' tag, they show that he hasn't made a significant movement since reaching western Mali last Saturday evening. This doesn't look like an hospitable place to stop so we are keeping everything crossed that we will see him leap into action soon. 

Having completed his crossing of the Sahara and reached the Sahel, Joe has moved further south within Chad and is now 171km (106 miles) due east of the capital N'Djamena and approximately 60km north west of the city of Ngama. 

A few lower quality locations suggest that Daniel has progressed south east through France over the last few days, reaching Lyon by Tuesday morning. He has since crossed the Alps into northern Italy and by 06:30 this morning was nearing the town of Alba in the Piedmont region of Italy. Last year he arrived in northern Italy on 7th July and remained here, close to the town of Garlasco in Lombardy until 12th August when he crossed the Sahara. 

New updates reveived this morning have confirmed that the lower quality signal we received from Croatia was a rogue location and that Calypso is still in northern Italy. The most recent data show him close to the Po river in the Lombardy region, just south of the town of Pavia. 

Having crossed the Channel to northern France, Grove II has flown 913km (568 miles) south to north central Spain. A series of updates received early yesterday morning showed that he spent most of the morning in the area around the village of Retiendas in the province of Guadalajar, 68km (42 miles) north of Madrid. 

Updates received from Ripple's tag early on Tuesday morning showed that he had left the UK and was 125km south east of Paris. He pressed on and by 09:55 on Tuesday morning he had reached Salins-les-Bains in eastern France. By 6am yesterday morning he had crossed into northern Italy and spent most of that day near Villafranca d'Asti in the Piedmont region, approximately 35km south east of Turin. Intriguingly we have since received a single lower-quality location suggesting that he is in Croatia but we'll have to wait for further updates before we can be certain of his new location. 

Over the last couple of days Cooper has been crossing some of the most desolate and inhospitable places on the planet. He has flow south through the Algerian Sahara, navigating to the west of the Hoggar Mountains, over eastern Mali and into south west Niger. By 05:38 this morning he was 286km (178 miles) north east of the capital Niamey.

Having moved to the coast of north eastern Spain over the last few days, Cooper has pressed on across the Mediterranean and into northern Africa. A couple of lower quality signals received between 6 and 7am this morning show him over the Sahara in north central Algeria, approximately 112km (70 miles) due north of the town of Foggaret Ezzoua. The daytime temperatures in this region in July have been known to soar to 50 °C (122 °F) or even higher, so Cooper won't be hanging around here!

Having made what appeared to be reasonable progress south over the Algerian Sahara, Charles' journey took an unexpected turn through Friday and into Saturday. He had flown directly south over Algeria and by 8am on Friday morning he was close to the southern border with Mali. He appears to have hit a weather front which pushed him south west and over the next 24 hours he traveled 690km (429 miles) south west over the desert towards the border with Mauritania. Had he continued due south from the border with Mali he would have reached the feeding opportunities presented by the habitats along the Niger river within 600km but instead the last transmission at 18:55pm on Saturday night showed him still in the desert on the Mali/Mauritania border. We're keeping our fingers crossed that we receive another update from Charles showing that he has completed his desert crossing.   

Joe has spent the last few weeks close to Saint Maxime on the French Riviera. He set off from there at around 7:30pm on Friday evening and we received a few updates from him as he crossed the Mediterranean to the west of Corsica and Sardinia.  By 08:41 am this morning he had flown a total of 3,339km (2,074 miles) south across the Sahara to Chad at an average speed of 55kph (34 mph),  He may yet move a little further south but hopefully now that he has conquered the desert he will be able to find a suitable place to rest and recover.