B.C. by Mastroianni and Hart for November 02, 2023

You talking to me, bird?

Are the colorists on strike at GoComics demanding more money. Even though the John Hart Studios has already paid for the color at their website?

By the way, surprising to know the bird isn’t actually white, the bird is actually red!

Slow? Physically or mentally?

Of course it’s the vortices. Whatever do you mean?

So that’s why my old VW was so slow, right? 62mph on a long straight with no wind!

Aerodynamics is a drag.

I think you should have gone with a slide show, John…

He needs a pair of General Electric J79 jet engines with afterburners. “If you put enough thrust behind anything, you can make it fly.” – Designers or the McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II.

What vortices? Looks pretty laminar to me.

It slows you down when flying with the turtle, but you should get good lift.

He just thinks John is a drag.

Science………!!!!!!!

Any excuse will do if it makes you feel better.

Maybe going “Neeeyowww” as you walk would help? ☺

A dimpled shell will take care of that and reduce drag. That will be enough to see [no] change in his top speed. :)

Did they have color in bc’s day?

When I was in pilot training at Moody AFB in Georgia (look for it by the big “O” in Okefenokee) we would have to deal with turtles who would sun themselves on the runway from time to time. The base sent out an airman in a truck to pick up the turtle and toss it back in the swamp. The tower would then advise, "Caution, wake turbulence, departing turtle).

There was one day when I heard the announcement that one of the runways was closed due to a alligator on the runway. It was not removed, “rasslin’ gators” apparently was not in the airman’s job description.

I feel somewhat cheated!

At least he gets the participation award!

So John has apparently learned something of fluid mechanics…let’s talk about Reynolds numbers and tortoise shells.

The bird is what makes John fly. That makes the bird slow.

Nonsense. That’s a lifting body if ever there was one! (This explains all those flying tortoises which we’ve always had to dodge.)

He’s so envious of the Aptera tortoise.

I hope he doesn’t add an airfoil as do many auto designers, who think adding a minimum (and useless) airfoil to a sedan makes it “sporty”.

Back to the comic strip and its scientific inaccuracies. The diagram shoes no vortices. None. Vortices would enhance drag but with no vortices shown, there is no corresponding increase in drag due to vortices. The diagram does show a reason for an increase in lift. Air flow as diagrammed gives lift but perhaps not enough for the tortoise to fly. That the tortoise shell generates some lift with wind is somewhat ironic because an inability to fly is the bird’s tag line.