Dynamic Soaring Dissected Albatrosses fly over the oceans in swooping, curving flight gliding thousands of kilometres in search of food, mostly without flapping their wings. This is known as dynamic soaring, which is the use of the energy of the horizontal wind to sustain speed and height. It is different from the soaring flight of most other birds and gliders which use the vertical motion of the air to maintain or gain height. Since the 1880's, a time before manned gliding flight had been achieved, the mechanism of dynamic soaring has been poorly explained by the Rayleigh cycle or the wind...