______________________________________________________________________________

People have always been fascinated by flight. The old greats would look at the sky, see birds and marvel at the way they were able to seemingly effortlessly float on the air. It must have been very frustrating not knowing how they were able to stay up. Whenever a person would jump of a cliff or fall out of a tree they defiantly didn't take to the sky. This conundrum of flight plagued humans until relatively recently, and we are still perfecting the fine science that is flying through the air.

To understand how a bird is able to stay up in the air one must first have a basic understanding of physics and the forces acting on the bird. The physics of flight can be very complicated but we can break it down into the simpler aspects in order to see how these creatures are able to soar on the wind.