• Brazilian free-tailed bats are the fastest flyers in the animal kingdom, shooting through the night skies at record speeds of over 160 kilometres per hour, a new study has found.
• Up to now, the speed record for horizontal flight was held by birds from the swift family: the common swift, for example, can reach speeds of over 100 kilometres per hour.

• The Brazilian free-tailed bat shoots through the night skies at over 160 kilometres per hour.
• Their aerodynamic body shape and longer than average wings compared to other bat species enable them to reach such vast speeds.

Other contenders

• Peregrine falcons can even reach speeds of up to 300 kilometres per hour when diving. In contrast, due to their wing structure, bats generate greater resistance, and are generally considered slower flyers.
• Animals with long and narrow wings usually fly faster than those with shorter and wider ones. For this reason, the scientists selected the Brazilian free-flying bat (Tadarida brasiliensis) for their study.

Source: The Hindu