"He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle. And away they all flew like the down of a thistle."
Flying reindeer have long been synonymous with Christmas. In 1823, they were described pulling Santa's sleigh in the now-infamous poem, “A Visit from St. Nicholas,” more commonly known as “’Twas the Night Before Christmas.” Indeed, modern tales of flying reindeer may even stretch back to Norse mythology, inspired by legends of Thor, the god of thunder who soared through the sky in a chariot pulled by magical goats.
Still, scientifically speaking, there are no known species of reindeer that can fly. (Bats are the only type of mammal capable of true flight.) But what does physics say about the plausibility of flying reindeer?
Reindeer, like anything else, can technically fly. But actually achieving liftoff would require a lot more energy than the animals typically have available.
If we’re ...
