It’s the trip of a lifetime.  Not just one life, but the survival of an entire species.

That’s what at stake in the effort to save endangered whooping cranes in North America.

In this extraordinary effort, ultralight aircraft are leading the rare birds on a migration.  They are now in Kentucky.

Sunday was Day 44 of this year’s Operation Migration.  After two days in Shelby County, it’s time to move on.

“We start at sunrise and we fly in that golden hour when it’s really calm, first thing in the morning,” explains Joe Duff, who co-founded Operation Migration in 1994.  He spoke to WHAS11 News just before taking off from Shelby County about 7:30am,

“We get maybe two or three hours per day,” Duff continued.  “The birds fly about 38 miles per hour, so we don’t get very far, anywhere between fifty to one hundred miles per day.  Only when the weather allows.  So it’s a long, slow process.”  And a methodical, careful one. 

Four ultralight aircraft, not the pilots, have been imprinted as the whooping cranes’ parents.  They lead the youngsters, teaching them a migratory route from Wisconsin to Florida.

For their own survival, the cranes need to fear humans, so pilots wear baggy costumes to disguise the human form.

“Our birds have never seen an uncostumed person up close,” Duff elaborated, “Never seen a car up close or a bicycle.  They’ve never heard a human voice. 

“It’s a very strict protocol, very difficult to manage.”

From a low of 15 surviving whooping cranes in the 1940’s, about 500 are alive today - including about 150 in captivity.  There is only one wild flock.

So this is an effort to build a second flock with hatchlings from the captive population.

17 cranes left Wisconsin in October, but on the way to Shelby County, one whooping crane strayed. 

Operation Migration is desperately searching for it even while pushing ahead with the remaining 16.

Humans are doing all they can, but the whooping cranes’ survival also depends on the birds themselves.

“We teach them how to migrate to Florida and they make it back on their own. Once they’ve done it once, they’re completely on their own.”

Kentucky is one of seven states in the migration. 

They are resting in Washington County, Kentucky tonight (Sunday night) and preparing for stormy weather.

Last year’s migration took 78 days.