By Susan Milius
PITTSBURGH — Predating jet travel by at least 65 million years wasn’t a problem for the biggest pterosaurs. These prehistoric creatures might have been able to fly up to 10,000 miles nonstop, according to research presented October 10 at the annual meeting of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology.
The original elite flyers included four species of what biomechanist Michael Habib, of Chatham University in Pittsburgh, calls supergiant pterosaurs: flying reptiles such as Quetzalcoatlus northropi from Texas. Appearing in the fossil record 70 million years ago, they stood about as tall as a modern giraffe and launched into the air spreading membrane wings to a total span of roughly 10 meters.
These supergiants “are big by pterosaur standards,” Habib said. “They are truly gruesomely huge by bird and bat standards.”