Peerless Pterosaur Could Fly Long-Distance For Days

NPR ^ | November 22, 2010 | Reid R. Frazier

[decimon]

>

The pterosaur's wingspan and size have spawned comparisons to dragons. But recently some scientists wondered whether the creature was too big to fly. A pair of papers recently asserted that the biggest pterosaurs may have been too heavy to get off the ground.

That seemed implausible to Habib. After all, the biggest birds often have the longest flight range. And Quetzalcoatlus, with its 35-foot wingspan, certainly fits the bill for gigantic.

So Habib teamed up with Mark Witton, a British paleontologist, to plug in factors like wingspan, weight and aerodynamics into a computer model.

The results, which they presented at a conference last month, were staggering: They revealed an animal that could fly up to 80 miles an hour for 7 to 10 days at altitudes of 15,000 feet. The maximum range, Habib says, was probably between 8,000 and 12,000 miles.

>

[Lancey Howard]

BUMP what you said.
I agree 100%.

[rmlew]

Haast’s eagle (Harpagornis moorei) from New Zealand weighed 18kg (~43 pound). They ate Moa and Maori, until the Maori killed them off about 600 years ago.

[Eye of Unk]

I wish some Black Ops group would have a new form of UAV that would look just like one of those, psychological warfare.

Take something like that or a robotic flying dragon and unleash it upon a third rate army with superstitious beliefs and it could terrorize them substantially.

Attack them with something from their deepest fears.

[Melas]

Proof?

[SunkenCiv]

sidebar:

Pterosaur reptile used “pole vault” trick for take-off
BBC | November 15, 2010 | Unknown
Posted on 11/15/2010 4:05:35 PM PST by decimon
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/2627633/posts

[SunkenCiv]

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