Soaring
Unpowered flights of longer duration and distance are possible if rising air is used to gain energy. This can further reduce the rate of descent or even increase height, which is known as soaring.
Soaring is where the object/animal obtains additional energy from rising air without exerting any power to remain airborne. An example is the albatross, which is a large seabird renowned for its ability to stay aloft by soaring above the waves for days at a time. Many other birds such as raptors and storks also deliberately soar to extend their time aloft. Insects are often caught by rising air and so can be dispersed by it.
Many types of glider aircraft are designed to exploit rising air and can therefore also soar.
Read more about this topic: Unpowered Flight
Famous quotes containing the word soaring:
“Think of our little eggshell of a canoe tossing across that great lake, a mere black speck to the eagle soaring above it!”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“My own brain is to me the most unaccountable of machinery—always buzzing, humming, soaring roaring diving, and then buried in mud. And why? What’s this passion for?”
—Virginia Woolf (1882–1941)
“There are in me, in literary terms, two distinct characters: one who is taken with roaring, with lyricism, with soaring aloft, with all the sonorities of phrase and summits of thought; and the other who digs and scratches for truth all he can, who is as interested in the little facts as the big ones, who would like to make you feel materially the things he reproduces.”
—Gustave Flaubert (1821–1880)