Deer jumping to deaths from bridge and landing near houses in ‘disturbing’ trend

Dozens of deer have jumped to their deaths in a small Pennsylvania town in a “disturbing” trend which has left locals calling for action before a person is killed by a falling animal.

Some 25 whitetail deer met their demise over the winter by plunging 60ft from a bypass bridge in Johnsonburg, Elk County, according to reports, with some landing near houses and even on a boat in populated areas.

Witnesses local news outlet WJAC the deer appear to make their way down from a nearby wooded area, only to get spooked when they find themselves surrounded on multi-lane overpass with loud roaring engines darting by.

Then it seems the agile woodland creatures feel they have no other option but to attempt to clear the jump to the street below, estimated to be nearly 60 ft.

While some of the animals land on grass or wooded areas, others have plunged into heavily populated area.

One local, Bill Boylan, told the Philadelphia Inquirer a deer even landed on his fishing boat outside his garage.

Julie Padasak, another concerned resident, said: “They're literally jumping to death.

“And that, to me, looking at them, it's disturbing."

The Pennsylvania Game Commission is tasked with clearing the rotting carcasses of the deer from people’s backyards. But the bodies lying in forests and grass nearby “pretty much just lay there,” Mr Boylan said.

Part of the problem that has not been addressed, local residents told WJAC, is that when one deer sees one jump over the low-walled overpass, the others quickly take note. The fear, it seems, drives a herd reaction.

Residents have also floated several solutions over the years to the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, including barriers to keep the deer from entering the overpass, fencing that would stop the deer jumping or even a net to catch the 150-pound falling animals.

The department told WJAC that they’ve only received word of the falling deer problem in recent weeks and are working to have a solution reached in the next several weeks.

“[We’re] trying to really determine where the deer are coming from, you know, how they are ending up on that bridge is really the problem we’ve got to solve first before we can determine if there’s anything we can do or not,” Tom Zurat, a district executive for the department, told WJAC.

Though the department contends that they’ve only recently heard about the overpass issue, Mr Boylan told the Inquirer that he and his neighbours have been lodging complaints for years.

He and his neighbours say it is not matter of inconvenience but is a real safety concern. They fear it is only a matter of time before one of the falling deer severely injuries or even kills someone below.