The birds were released in Narbonne in southern France at the start of a race back to their lofts in northern Europe, but were soon hit by a summer storm. The Belgian pigeon federation described the result as a disaster and blamed the organizers for allowing the birds to take to the air despite bad weather forecasts. Pascal Bodengien, president of the federation, told public broadcaster VRT: “It’s an emotional drama, an economic drama – it’s quite simply very sad.” He suggested that some of the Belgian birds had flown to Germany by accident, adding: “Some of them will return in the next few days, but the majority have been lost for good.” Dovecote map gone wrong Didier Tisson, a spokesman for the federation, said the widely reported figure of 20,000 missing birds was “totally false”. He added that there were about 3,000 to 4,000 lost birds from Belgium, an “extraordinary” number, but was unable to confirm the tally for other countries. Belgium pioneered the pigeon sport, where birds released hundreds of miles from home compete to make the fastest return. Racing pigeons wear tracking devices, making it possible to tell which bird was the fastest. Pigeons are believed to navigate using the Earth’s magnetic field lines and their sense of smell. But that well-tuned sense of navigation went awry last Friday when, 18 miles (30km) from the start of the race, they flew into a storm that is believed to have left them disoriented and tired. Losses are painful for devoted pigeons. Amateurs can spend two to three years raising a bird and thousands of euros to sought-after breeders who will provide the next generation of champions. Luc Henry, a pigeon man from Paifve in eastern Belgium, had entered 87 birds in the competition but only 36 had returned when he spoke to French-language public broadcaster RTBF in an interview broadcast on Tuesday. He said the “pigeons didn’t stand a chance” in a race that was “completely distorted”. Ulrich Lemmens, from Balen, Flanders, who had only 15 of the 57 pigeons that entered the race, described his losses as truly painful. “In my 13 years as a pigeon fancier, this is the first time this has happened. Three years of work have gone up in smoke. My goal is Barcelona [a prestigious pigeon race] in 2024. But now I can forget about it,” he said. Despite the sport’s working-class origins, it is increasingly attracting big money. In 2020, a Chinese buyer paid a record €1.6m (£1.3m) for a champion racing pigeon from Belgium. Belgium has around 18,000 people who keep pigeons and is a world center for the sport. As a result, Belgian teams organize many international competitions, including the disastrous competition in the south of France. After an emergency meeting on Monday, the Belgian pigeon federation called for the resignation of top officials of the race organisers, Liège Independent. Tison said the Liege pigeon society had breached the sport’s rules and that the matter would be raised at a meeting with the minister in charge of animal welfare in the Walloon regional government on Thursday. Liège Independent director Francine Lageot issued an official apology on Belgian television, saying it was “true that the competition did not go well for different reasons”. But in a statement, the Liège Independent responded to the “unfortunate” allegations about the match’s staging. While admitting a breach of the rules, organizers said the release of the birds had been agreed with French, Dutch and German officials and that the president of the Belgian national team had been informed. The Liège Independent added that “climatic conditions” in the coming days would make the competition even more difficult, due to rising temperatures and violent headwinds. It said: “At 7.20 am [last Friday] the pigeons were released in the presence of 40 individuals. “They immediately took a good heading to the north. We are extremely sorry that we did not achieve the expected result and the correct return of our birds. Our dearest wish is that all fanciers see their pigeons back in their loft.”