That’s why modern missiles use proportional navigation, in which the system is constantly sizing up the line of sight and making small tweaks en route. But that’s not the most effective approach, given that it leaves little room to make adjustments on the fly. One way to hit a moving object in midair is to measure the speed and direction of the target, gauge when and where to make contact, and then launch forward in the right direction, at the exact right speed. Delving into the field results, he realized that the bird's speeds and “trajectories were surprisingly well explained by the same guidance laws that missiles use to intercept targets.” Mills's work builds on data collected from GPS trackers and body cams on eight falcons, dispatched by University of Oxford zoologists. But this also seemed counterintuitive to the bird’s ability to reliably hit its prey. In the past, scientists thought extreme speeds added an element of surprise to the attack, says Mills, a behavioral ecology researcher at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands. It all starts with the Peregrine’s velocity. And while the birds’ attack-success rates can vary wildly by location, season, sex, and target type, it’s evident that there’s some predictive power behind their dives. The species, says lead author Robin Mills, depends on an innate navigational system-similar to that found in military-grade missiles. One idea holds that in lieu of brakes, the falcon unfurls its wings just before it strikes its prey, reducing its speed enough to make any last-minute adjustments and avoid injury. Ī study published yesterday in PLOS Computational Biology shows that the strategy is more complex, however. For decades, scientists have tried to understand how the raptor pulls off its feats without hurting itself or missing the mark completely. Yet as much as the Peregrine is a paragon, it’s also an enigma. By folding its wings in to minimize drag, the boomerang-shaped birds can hurtle thousands of feet through the air at speeds of close to 200 miles per hour- an unparalleled maneuver in the animal kingdom.
When it comes to hunting on the fly, nothing beats the Peregrine Falcon.
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