Movie 2

High-speed recordings (1500 fps) of three locusts (warm, cold and dead S. gregaria) falling from a horizontal plane onto glass substrates. The timing of the videos is synchronized to the point of impact. Note the active movement of the wings of the warm 465 locust, which presumably affects the impact speed (acceleration or deceleration) and impact orientation. Cold locusts used their wings notably less to accelerate or decelerate their falling movement. Dead locusts obviously neither showed active movement of wings, nor passive opening of wings, which explains their falling speed close to the theoretical maximum of a free falling body.