8K Honey Bees Come To World Trade Center, NYPD Comes To Rescue

NEW YORK, NY — Who you gonna call when thousands of honeybees decide to hang out on your office building?

The New York Police Department's finest beekeepers.

The office in building in question was 3 World Trade Center — the 80-story tower that is home to Uber, among other businesses — where 8,000 honeybees decided to swarm Saturday night, according to the NYPD.

"There was quite the buzz late last night," the NYPD tweeted Sunday. "Thankfully, a quick response from @NYPDBees resulted in the safe capture of our flying friends."

The bees were safely captured and relocated to an apple orchard, where they can go about their honey-making business, the NYPD said.

This is not the year's first sting operation for the NYPD Bee force — which recently sucked about 15,000 unwelcome guests from a tree in Queens — and who last year tackled back-to-back removals in Times Square.

Honeybee swarming is how colonies reproduce to form new colonies, according to biologists at Clemson University. When a honey bee colony outgrows its home, becomes too congested, or too populated for the queen’s pheromones to control the entire workforce, then the workers signal that it is time to swarm.

The swarms usually happen in the spring a wide variety of plants are in bloom, making nectar and pollen resources bountiful, the Clemson article said.

When honeybees are swarming, they are not nearly as defensive as they are around their hive because they are not protecting developing young bees or honey stores. If disturbed or agitated, they will defend the cluster; therefore, it is advisable for people to keep their distance from a swarm of bees to avoid being stung.

New Yorkers responded to news of Operation Honeybee with expected surprise that swarm removal was the responsibility of the NYPD.

"Why are the police department dealing with bees?" asked one Twitter user.

"Why do the police have a beekeeper unit instead of the parks department?" asked another.

"Lol," responded @MH88402731. "Why wasn't he wearing a beekeeper suit?