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Small Bird Astounds Scientists With 11,200km Flight
Zeb writes "Scientists are marveling over a small female bar-tailed godwit somewhere in New Zealand who has a world record for non-stop flying — an epic 11,200 kilometers. A major international study into the birds has been published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B and it offers an explanation as to why the godwits fly so far from Alaska to New Zealand in a single bound. The birds flew non-stop for up to and covered more than 11,200km. The flight path shows the birds did not feed en route and would be unlikely to sleep." The linked Wikipedia entry claims an even longer trip record, of 11,570 kilometers.
In the animal kingdom, its quite common for creatures to go without what we would consider restful sleep. Cows sleep standing, sharks sleep while swimming, why couldn't these birds manage some form of rest while flying?
If sharing a song makes you a pirate, what do I have to share to be a ninja?
Admit it... you had to look it up (unless you're in physics or live outside the USA)
If you can read this... 01110101 01110010 00100000 01100001 00100000 01100111 01100101 01100101 01101011
The distinction seems to be feeding; swifts can feed while they continue flying, whereas these birds are waders and can't feed until they stop. It's like the furthest airplane flight record distinction of refueling or not.
NB: As the same FAQ page you linked earlier points out, helicopter flight, as the project is attempting, is much more inefficient than winged flight. Human-powered flight with winged craft had already been achieved with fairly good results 20 years ago - almost 4 hours of flight covering 74 miles.