Life in the Journey

This has to be one for the history books. We were on our way home when we walked past the Dry Cleaners (which is in the bottom of a nice apt. bldg w/ balconies). We noticed a couple of people standing outside & looking up. So, we looked up as well & in the flower basket hanging over the balcony railing of the 2nd floor apartment there was a huge, beautiful bird. I could tell it was a bird of prey by its size & head, but for the most part, it had its back to us. We were like, wow, how unusual to see a bird like that on 6th Ave. My first thought upon seeing the bird was that it was an eagle (not the bald, national bird kind, just a normal one) - though, admittedly, I am no bird expert. But, I have seen eagles in zoos before and I thought, wow, how cool to just be walking home from lunch & see an eagle in the middle of the city. Then, this man came up to us & said he saw the bird swoop down and grab a pigeon in mid air & then land in that flower box & start devouring the pigeon. CRAZY HUH! It was so cool b/c the guy said he saw the whole thing and was telling us how incredibly rare of a sighting it was. The guy said he was from Brazil and lived near the Amazon Jungle & he'd never seen a bird catch its prey. He was shocked that he had this experience in the middle of a vast metropolis. Sure enough, as we watched the bird, we could see the little pigeon feathers strewn about as the big bird continued picking at it (feel no pity for the pigeon - they are vile, vile creatures). When I asked Brazil Man what type of bird the big one was, he said eagle - aha, I was right (or at least Brazil Man concurred with my original hypothesis). Chris is skeptic over whether it was an eagle, but I know for a fact it wasn't a vulture or buzzard or like yucky bird. I suppose it could have been a hawk, though I don't know much about those either. And, I further presume there may be more birds of prey than just eagles & hawks - such as kites, falcons, owls (it definitely wasn't an owl) and harriers - thank you Wikipedia. Nonetheless, I'm sticking with my original opinion - we saw an eagle devouring a pigeon that he caught midair in the second story flower box of an apartment complex in the middle of Manhattan! How many people can say that!?

**Update - After reviewing the comments, it looks like it wasn't an eagle after all. Paw-paw's observation that eagles generally do not catch their prey mid-air & prefer fish, combined with Holly's tip that hawks (particularly the infamous Pale Male and his numerous offspring) are common to the Central Park area, lead me to believe it was in fact a light colored red-tailed hawk. In further support, Holly's comment provides a link to a similar incident where the Pale Male went after a pigeon mid air. I'm afraid to say the evidence is mounting against my original eagle classification. Accordingly, below is probably a more accurate representation =)