Scientists: T-Rex couldn't move fast

CNN ^

[RoughDobermann]

STANFORD, California (CNN) -- New models of the leg muscles of Tyrannosaurus Rex suggest that a real T-Rex might not have passed the screen test for "Jurassic Park." Stanford University researchers writing in the British journal Nature this week suggest that a T-Rex could not have been able to run as fast as the one in the movie -- and might not have been able to run at all.

[Martin Tell]

... T-Rex hunting is that they may in fact have been ambush hunters ...

Is this possible? I thought their brains were smaller than algore's.

[r9etb]

Hmmmm. Well, I suppose it depends on how you define "fast."

For example, elephants can't run, but they can still "walk very fast," at 18-20 mph.

Yeah, I know the body structures are different -- the point is, there's plenty of ways to move fast, and who's really claiming 45 mph, anyway?

Just as an example, T-rex had a stride of 12-15 feet, meaning that if it took two strides every second (about the same as a human), it could move along at close to 20 mph.

So from the looks of it, these guys are way off-base.

The real question is, of course, how fast T-rex's prey could move. If at 20 mph T-rex was faster than a blorphosaur, then that's fast enough.

[null and void]

It's slightly more complex than just flexible wings. The failure of the model to allow bees to fly, even given flexible wings lead to the research that discovered the "flap, slap and peel" method of gaining additional lift by pinching the wings together to force a jet of air downward, then peel apart to generate a partial vacuum above the wings.

My point is that there might be a little more going on than the model shows.

IIRC, and I might not, track fossils show a stride consistant with high speed running.

[null and void]

You recall correctly. My point is many academics think their models are more accurate than reality...

[RightWhale]

T-Rex would have preferred a modification of Method 1. It would tromp on its prey and then rip the roadkill into bite-size morsels at its leasure.

[pabianice]

Flash! New York Daily News (Feb 27) ... Sen. Hillary Clinton was injured today when she was unable to get out of the way of an enraged, charging giant tortoise at the Brooklyn Zoo.

"He came at me so fast!" she said from her stretcher as 24 paramedics struggled to load her pallet into a US Air Force C-17 Globemaster III for the flight to Bethesda...

[RoughDobermann]

Lots of good info here Looks like T-Rex is thought to be one of the more intelligent dinosaurs; only the highly advanced theropods, such as Deinonychus and Velociraptor, are thought to be smarter than T-Rex. Thanks r9etb!

[fourdeuce82d]

"...think their models are more accurate than reality..."

According to my calculations, I am better looking than Tom Cruise, more intelligent than Steve Hawkings, wealthier than Bill Gates, and am dating Catherine Zeta Jones.

Of course, I may have misplaced a decimal point somewhere...

[null and void]

LOL!!!

[medved]

We know that dinosaurs moved; they were vertebrates, and we have their trackways (sequences of footprints) preserved in certain sediments as fossils. One popular question is how fast did they move? Did some of them run as fast as the modern cheetah? Most scientists involved in the investigation of dinosaur locomotion think not. We have several lines of evidence that can help us estimate how dinosaurs could move.

I hate to keep harping on this one, but you have to consider gravity in any such line of reasoning. It is a very simple demonstration that there is a roughly 20,000 lb. limit for land animals in our present world; anything heavier than that would be unable to stand or walk at all.

[Alex Murphy]

This is bunk, pure and simple. Obviously the triceratops and apatasaur lobbyists influenced the Cretaceous government to threaten pulling the research grants, if the scientists didn't modify their conclusions. Pulled the wool over their eyes, as it were.

Meteors, hell. Damn soft money funnelled into the liberal vegetarian dinosaurs' camp probably caused the dinosaurs' extinction.

[Martin Tell]

T-Rex is thought to be one of the more intelligent dinosaurs...

Growl! Good site; thanks, RD!

[Thud]

Yeah, I just don't see how T-Rex could immobilize large prey long enough to get in a good bite, without sitting on 'em.

[null and void]

A shark doesn't immobilize it's prey. I just takes out a chunk, backs offf and waits for it to bleed to death.

Komodo dragons take a bite the follow the prey until it bleeds out, or sucumbs to septic shock. (Komodo dragons have very dirty mouths).

Fossil T. Rex teeth have serations with septic bacteria breeding pockets at their bases...

[stanz]

Thanks for this.

[stanz]

You're right. Every time I look at our small parrot, I get the feeling I'm looking at an undersized T-Rex - - those yellow-tringed eyes and claws. He moves pretty fast when agitated.

[RoughDobermann]

My pleasure!

[stanz]

oops. that's yellow-ringed eyes.

[RoughDobermann]

I hate to keep harping on this one, but you have to consider gravity in any such line of reasoning. It is a very simple demonstration that there is a roughly 20,000 lb. limit for land animals in our present world; anything heavier than that would be unable to stand or walk at all.

Are you saying that gravity exerted less influence in the Cretaceous than it does today? If so, I wasn't aware of that. Titanosaurus weighed in at approximately 14,700 kg...

[sinclair]

Why would T-Rex even need to run fast? Their prey was very large and very slow. It seems to me as though the controversy is moot.