When bird flu hit the UK, suffering seabirds died in their thousands. Australia’s wild flocks will soon do the same

Greater crested terns were the first native bird to suffer a mass mortality event from bird flu in Australia. One expert expects the disease will spread across the continent within a year. Photograph: DEA/P. JACCOD/De Agostini/Getty Images

Sandwich terns are a graceful seabird known for their committed, forceful and spectacular plunging dives into the ocean to catch fish.

Thousands of the species started to fall sick across Europe in 2022 with tens of thousands dying as a lineage of the H5N1 bird flu – 2.3.4.4b – spread through the continent’s wild flocks.