The Impossible Physics of Flying on a Dragon
This post was originally published on August 15th, 2017. It's been updated for the eighth and final season of Game of Thrones.
Say what you want about Daenerys Targaryen's other qualities, one thing is beyond question: She is one hell of a dragon rider. In years past, we've seen her learn to fly aboard her reptilian "children." Last season her aerial prowess accelerated. During Daenerys' attack on the Lannisters, she rides mighty Drogon with ease as the beast cuts through aggressive aerial turns to fry her enemies with fire. And if the premiere episode of season eight is any indicator, there will be dragon-riding aplenty.
Would such a thing really be possible? Everything on a fantasy series like Game of Thrones comes with a huge grain of salt, of course. In Dany's case, A) there seems to be some kind of magic involved in her relationship with the beasts, and B) dragons are not real. Yet we can use some real-world analogues to investigate whether a person really could ride a dragon. Seriously.
First of all, could there be a flying reptile large enough to carry a human on its back? Maybe so. Though it presumably didn't breathe fire, a real dragon-like reptile did soar above what is now the southwestern United States about 70 million years ago. Called Quetzalcoatlus northrapi by paleontologists, this huge flying beast had a wingspan of about 50 feet-14 feet wider than four-seat Cessna 172. Estimates of the animal's weight vary, but some experts peg it at nearly 600 pounds. So it is not out of the question that a flying animal could accommodate a human passenger.
If it were possible to get airborne on a Quetzalcoaltus, a dragon, or any similar beast, could a person stay on it? On Game of Thrones, Daenerys stays glued to Drogon's back like a barnacle on a sea turtle's shell. Even when her dragon yaws, pitches, and rolls after being hit by an arrow shot from Qyburn's ballista, the dainty dragon queen hangs tough in the face of the forces of physics trying to pry her loose.
Is that realistic? Let's just say the scientific literature covering the dynamics of dragon riding is a bit scant, so the best we can do is look at what's available for similar activities, the two closest being the physics of riding rodeo animals and roller coasters. Neither activity is a perfect analogy, but they're close enough for broad analysis.
Simply speaking, dragon riding is an activity that involves controlling the forces of thrust and lift originating from the flapping of the dragon's powerful wings to overcome gravity and drag. From the dragon rider's standpoint, the roller coaster-like combination of gravitational and inertial forces, along with centripetal acceleration, causes her to experience a lot of pushing, pulling, and yanking as the dragon climbs, dives, and veers. Those g-forces, due to the animal's accelerating and decelerating as it flies, would push would a rider up, down, and sideways.
The question is how great are the G-forces she would experience. Scientist and former rodeo rider Stephen Wharton used an array of sophisticated gyros and accelerometers, not unlike a Nintendo Wii Remote, to measure the G-forces that bull riders experience when the chute opens and the eight-second clock starts to tick. The results of his testing showed that, while mounted, a bull rider experiences accelerations of in excess of 3 g's.
On Game of Thrones, dragon riding consists of mostly gentle glides and loops. But there are times of extreme acceleration and deceleration comparable to a being aboard a spinning rodeo bull, which means that Daenerys-if she weighs, say, 120 lbs.-occasionally feels like there's a 360 pound force on her. To counter that, she has to use her muscles to hold on to Drogon's horn-like neck protrusions as well as shift her center of mass left and right, up and down.
PRCA bull rider (and Game of Thrones fan) Guthrie Murray has ridden hundreds of big, angry animals His conclusion about Dany's dragon-riding? "I'm not sure. It doesn't look like there's much on a dragon to hold onto."
Indeed, the Mother of Dragons doesn't use a saddle to ride. In the real world, this issue is one of the reasons humans ride horses and donkeys but not, say, cattle. Cows and steers have bony, uncomfortable backs that make it next to impossible place a saddle. Compared to horses or camels, cattle are much wider, so it's difficult for many riders to get their legs around them at all, much less keep them there for a long ride. Murray notes that a bull rider uses his legs to grip the beast, and with a 10-foot-wide dragon, that's not possible. He also speculates that the scales of a dragon may well be more slippery than the hair of a bull, making the job even tougher.
On the other hand, the dragon, unlike the bull, isn't actively trying to throw the rider. That means Daenerys doesn't have to deal with the violent side-to-side spins that most pro riders feel are the most difficult motion to overcome. Plus, you know, she's got that Targaryen dragon-riding blood that appears to form some kind of spiritual connection with her flying reptiles.
Is riding a great dragon realistic? Game of Thrones physics may not be as far off from reality as you might think. As Murray points out in his cowboy drawl: "A lot of pro riders say they can ride just about anything that moves."
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