450 sheep jump to their death in eastern Turkey

Stunned shepherds while eating their breakfast, watched in disbelief as their herd of 1,500 sheep jumped to their death from a cliff top in the eastern part of Turkey. The shepherds, who had left their sheep grazing to eat breakfast, said that there was nothing they could do. One sheep had strayed to the cliff edge and jumped from the cliff, the other sheep then followed. A total of 450 animals died, as the pile of bodies grew bigger it broke the fall of the remaining sheep. "There's nothing we can do. They're all wasted," Nevzat Bayhan, a member of one of 26 families whose sheep were grazing together in the herd. The incident happened in the town of Gevas, located in the Van province of eastern Turkey and is said to have created of loss of $100,000 collectively to the families of the town - a significant loss to Turkey where the average GDP is around $2700 per head. "Every family had an average of 20 sheep," another villagerAbdullah Hazar said, "but now only a few families have sheep left. It's going to be hard for us." Â