Two of the District's newest high-flying residents are getting the star treatment thanks to D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier.
Just outside the police academy in Southwest there a nest now includes two eaglets, and thanks to National Geographic, you can watch them 24 hours a day on a live-streaming web camera.
"Recently Chief Lanier came up with the idea of putting a web cam nearby so that everybody in the city and the nation could watch the eagles grow up," said Barbara Moffet with National Geographic.
Moffet said the bald eagle babies are believed to be between six and eight weeks old, which is around the age that they start their flying lessons. The pair will not actually take flight until 11 weeks.
"Since the camera went live, my productivity has gone down a little bit," Chief Cathy Lanier said, adding, "I have it up on one screen in my office. It stays up constantly."
The chief says the parent eagles have been around the academy for about six years. This is the first time that there's been a camera installed to watch them.
Lanier said after a day of listening to the briefings on the situation in Boston she felt relieved when she turned on the site to see the eagles.
"Both of the adult birds were on the edge of the nest, and when I looked at the two birds, it just struck me that it was something I needed to see at the end of the Boston day," she said.
Lanier posted a link to the web cam on the MPD list-servs that night and said she's already gotten more than 300 responses from residents who are excited to see the Eagles.
"I'm an animal lover, period," the chief said, "but there's just something about the American bald eagle ... They're beautiful birds to begin with, but it's so patriotic, and when you're here in the nation's capital and you see them looking over the Potomac River, it's just an amazing sight."
The parent eagles are named Barack and Michelle, after the president and first lady. Lanier said she's been told she could name the babies, but since no one is sure about their gender she's gone with gender neutral names: Liberty and Justice.
Photo Credit: National Geographic