The First Dynamic Equations of Stability in Bird Flight

Inertial properties were something that previous studies largely ignored or treated as unimportant. Harvey and her team gathered up 36 frozen bird cadavers from the Beedee Biodiversity Museum at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada. To quantify each bird's stability and maneuverability, they calculated an aerodynamic factor called the static margin. That's the distance between its center of gravity and its neutral point relative to the dimensions of the wing.