Blue Crab Boulevard

It's a mooseteor! Oh sure, our insurance agent thought we were crazy when we asked if our vehicles were covered for damages resulting from cows hurtling out of the sky. Like that has never happened. (It turns out we are under a cowmprehensive rider.) But we foresee another lengthy phone conversation after this latest news: Moose playing Geronimo on passing cars.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - Alaska State Troopers see plenty of hazards, but Trooper Howard Peterson was nearly felled by a new one: falling moose. Peterson was driving Feb. 2 on the Seward Highway south of Anchorage when something big and black fell out of the sky about 20 feet in front of his patrol car. "Falling rock!" he thought, ready to steer clear if it bounced onto the highway.

The thing didn't roll or shatter. It turned out to be a moose that fell from cliffs next to the highway.

Drivers often see Dall sheep on the cliffs but rarely moose. Peterson estimates the animal fell 150 feet or more.

It was windy that night, Peterson said, and a gust may have startled the moose into a fatal fall.

"They occasionally have bad days like the rest of us," said wildlife biologist Rick Sinnott. "They slip and fall. Maybe he was reaching for a branch and the snow just gave way."

We'd only point out that it is slightly more than a bad day when you hurtle 150 feet or so and leave a crater with antlers. We're just saying. While normally we would have thought this might be Bullwinkle trying to upstage his lighter and more airworthy partner, Rocky, in this case, we're pretty sure Bullwinkle is holed up in Frostbite Falls.

It's too cold for flying lessons.