Those awestriking murmuration compilations never cease to amaze one. How can birds create such amazing formations and flying sequences with pinpoint accuracy and perfection?
In a bid to answer these question, researchers from the University of Queensland published a study on Wednesday in PLOS ONE.
They concluded that due to birds’ evolution over millions of years, they have acquired extraordinary flight awareness and cohesiveness among each other to pull off flight formations with such precision and mastery. They also pointed out to the fact that humans can pick up a thing or two from the birds to improve their short and horrific career in flight.
The researchers used ten birds for this study, specifically parakeets or ‘budgies’. Using a tunnel, they set the birds free on opposite ends and went through 102 rounds of flights. Astonishingly, none of the 102 flights resulted in crashes, rubber stamping the mastery of the birds.
The researcher noted that the birds avoided the head-on collisions by always banking right, and also by changing their altitude.
The video below a clip from the experiment:
Study author Mandyam Srinivasan said, “As air traffic becomes increasing busy, there is a pressing need for robust automatic systems for manned and unmanned aircraft, so there are real lessons to be learned from nature.”
Hopefully, these lessons from nature will be taken and applied to the ever increasing air traffic in today’s world. Banking right seems to be a pretty “simple” rule, but these codes have allowed birds to rule the skies with an unmatched magnificence and beauty for centuries.
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