Cats can survive drops from seemingly impossible heights thanks primarily to two things:
- Cats have a righting reflex. A mechanism in their inner ears helps them determine up from down, and they use their tails and back legs to whip their bodies around as they fall. The whole process takes less than a second.
- At greater heights, cats are able to extend all four limbs so their bodies act like parachutes, using air resistance(drag) to reduce their terminal velocity, or rate of fall.
Feline biology is unique and impressive, cats have lots of extra skin, and that combination means they can dramatically increase the surface area of their bodies when they splay their limbs out in mid-flight.
Kitties have lighter bone structures compared to similarly-sized animals, which also works to their benefit.
However, there’s no magic at work here: Cats can still be seriously hurt by falls, and many falls are fatal.
Parachuting doesn’t do much to help for shorter falls either, so a cat falling from a fourth floor window could have a higher risk of injury than a cat who falls from the 9th floor. That’s generally, but not always, the case.
Don’t get any ideas, please. Cats don’t really have nine lives, and any fall could potentially kill them, so this isn’t something you should try to test for a Youtube video or for “lulz.”
Cats are fully sentient animals who have their own feelings, including anxiety and fear. They deserve to be treated with respect and care.
No comments:
Post a Comment