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Producers of Sir David Attenborough’s latest docu-series, Wild Isles, were warned the veteran television broadcaster was at risk of dying from bird flu during filming.
In an interview with the Radio Times, Wild Isles producer Alastair Fothergill revealed the show had plans for the 96-year-old natural historian to interact with birds while filming on Skomer, a Welsh island.
“The shearwaters are not great at taking off, so what the warden on the island said is, ‘If you sit David close to the burrows, they will almost certainly climb up his arm on to his head and take off from his head’,” Fothergill said.
“We thought, ‘Wow, that could be TV gold’. That was the plan.”
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However, plans were dashed following reports of bird flu hitting neighbouring island Grassholm, meaning the highly deadly disease could also be present on Skomer.
“I have an old friend who’s an expert on infectious diseases and I rang him up for his opinion,” Fothergill said.
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David Attenborough in The Green Planet.
“He said, ‘Well, bird flu is actually extremely hard to catch, but if [Attenborough] gets it he will die.”
Wild Isles is believed to be Sir Attenborough’s final project filmed on location.
The five-part BBC One documentary series, due for release in the UK from March 12, explores the natural wildlife of Britain and Ireland, from orca hunting seals off the Shetland Islands to a London park.
Attenborough has appeared in over a hundred documentaries, from the 1950’s series Zoo Quest which took the natural historian through places such as South America and New Guinea, to 2006’s Planet Earth, filmed in 64 countries.
There are no plans yet for Wild Isles to air in NZ.
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