Speed of Track-Maker


    Tracks can be used to determine the speed at which the dinosaur was traveling.  Various methods have been developed; the one seen here is the Alexander Method,

  V ~ 0.25g0.5SL1.67h-1.17

where V is velocity, g is the acceleration due to gravity, SL is the stride length, and h is the height at the hip.

    The average walking speed for all dinosaurs was around a few kilometers per hour.  Maximum speeds have been calculated to reach sixty km/h for some species, but tracks have not been observed to have this speed.  In general, bipeds were faster that quadrupeds.

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