Tuesday, November 02, 2021

Fly with bird wings on the moon at the Icarus Theme Park

It is said that if people were to fly like birds, our wings would need to be at least *6.7m wide (about 2ft). People also talk about strapping on wings and flying like a bird on Saturn's moon Titan; because the gravity is very weak, and the atmosphere is 50% thicker than on Earth.

Titan is pretty far - but I think this experience should be possible on Earth's moon, where there is 1/6th earths gravity; and if you build a nice dome then you could pressurize the air to earths pressure. I can't say for sure - but I think (with enough effort) human-powered short flights should be possible; or at least wing assisted giant leaps will be possible! (Kind of what chickens do).

            Photo by GerhardLipold form PxHere

One limitation is arm muscles which are a bit weak compared to our leg muscles. For example the human powered helicopter AeroVelo Atlas and Aeroplane Gossamer Eagle both used leg power. For thrust we might might benefit from using giant fins like with freediving in water, but bigger. And then wings would be for lift and control.

Photo by Jean-Marc Kuffer

I imagine a giant domed play area with trees you could fly up to and "roost" on, then glide down. In an environment where exercise is crucial for maintaining muscle mass - this could be a super fun way to go about it. A dream.

While we're at it - some other sports that could be super fun on the moon - freestyle diving into a deep ball pit, where you kind of fall in slow motion and have lots of time to do cool spinny tricks. Also - trampoline jumping where you can go crazy high, comparatively limited risk to breaking your neck. Basket ball could be fun - dunking on impossibly high baskets, though I imagine that dribbling would get annoying fast.

*These people are Payal Marathe, who wrote this in Yale Scientific and everyone quoting her, I haven't found any other source.
https://www.yalescientific.org/2013/03/qa-why-cant-humans-fly/

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