Birders Hunt For Hero Cabbie Who Rescued Hawk On FDR Drive

EAST VILLAGE, NY — Animal conservationists are hunting for a hero cabbie who rescued an injured red-tailed hawk from a Manhattan highway.

The brave driver spotted the bird of prey while cruising along FDR Drive early Tuesday, stopped to scoop up the creature — in one hand — and clutched the one-year-old hawk as he continued driving, searching for a NYPD patrol car.

His search took him all the way into Brooklyn where he found officers to hand the hawk off to, according to the Rita McMahon, the director of the Wild Bird Fund which is caring for the hawk now appropriately named Taxi.

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"We're asking the cab driver to come forward because what he did was really brave," said McMahon, whose bird fund handles more than 30 percent of the state's wildlife rehabilitation and has cared for 25 injured hawks this year.

"A little bit foolish because driving with a hawk is not something we recommend, but he was determined to get that hawk help. He really deserves credit."

The police officers placed Taxi in a cage and visited three animal refuges before finally bringing her to the Wild Bird Fund on the Upper West Side.

"She was a little messed up when she got to us," said McMahon, who tweeted about Taxi on the group's Twitter. "She was feeling better so she was jumping around in the cage, but she didn't suffer any fractures only swelling."

The hawk was likely stunned by slamming into a glass window of a high-rise by the highway, McMahon suspects near Stuyvesant Town where several high-rises line the road.

Taxi was put on a regimen of fluids and anti-inflammatory medication. Come Wednesday, a veterinarian gave the hawk a clean bill of health to be released.

"We could release her now but this is a first year bird so since the temperature is dropping we're going to wait until the weekend so that her return to the wild won't be so harsh," McMahon said.

Taxi will fly the coop on Saturday when birders will release her in Central Park.

The city's Taxi and Limousine Commission is trying to find the bird-loving cabbie who saved her, but as of Wednesday had no luck, a spokeswoman with the agency said.

If the young hawk, who McMahon describes as a "fierce, tough cookie," came around while the cabbie was holding her she would have ripped into him with her talons — and she would not have let go.

"It could have ended badly for him," said McMahon, who hopes the cabbie comes forward before Saturday so the bird and driver can be reunited.

"We're a big city and people think we're not connected to nature but New Yorkers will go out of their way to help wildlife — and he's emblematic of that."

Anyone with information about the cabbie is urged to contact the Wild Bird Fund at 646-306-2862 or message the fund through its website.

Photo courtesy of Phyllis Tseng/Wild Bird Fund