Do flying red dragons leave contrails?

[MavrickWeirdo]

It depends on what they had for lunch.

 

[S'mon]

No.

 

[The Shaman]

I mean a bird of prey (eagle, I think, but Im not sure right now) can go into a dive on its prey and reach 200 mph. Now if a tiny little bird can do that...

That would be the peregrine falcon.

My family and I were driving home from a short trip the beach yesterday and I saw this beautiful contrail in the sky, so I decided to put this question to the board.

The board's responses are interesting. I appreciate that some folks offered to explain how contrails work - if I was unfamiliar with the physics of it, that would be very helpful. I did specifically postulate red dragons, however, because of my familiarity with contrail formation - I also considered gold dragons, but I didn't want to make the question needlessly complex. Regarding the Wikipedia quotation above, I'm a little surprised that the wiki author specifically cited jet engines, as prop engines are capable of leaving contrails as well - I may contact the wiki editors with a few photos to get that corrected.

This question was less about contrails specifically and more about how folks on the board see dragons outside of their printed stats. I have always described fire-breathing dragons in my fantasy settings (by the way, the dragons in my game-worlds are not "color-coded for your convenience"...) as radiating great heat - not enough to cause a mechanical effect on the characters, but certainly enough to be uncomfortably noticeable when standing close to one. (In fact, one of the reasons that fire-breathers in my campaigns tend to lair in volcanoes or geysers is to mask their tell-tale heat signature.) In the days of infravision, I described dragons as almost pure white and painfully bright to the viewer.

There are also the dragon's exhalations, which are akin to steam vents - a dragon once "Harrumphed!" a knight-adventurer in my game, and describing the effect I noted that not only was the knight parbroiled by the breath, but that his armor was dripping, soaked by condensation.

Finally, the question also includes another aspect of dragons - how high do they fly? Since air resistance is lower the higher you go (as is lift), I've assumed dragons would fly as high as they could for sake of efficiency. It's also tactically advantageous, as they can usually become death-from-above on unsuspecting prey or enemies in this way - Tolen Mar, my dragons attack in much the same fashion, their outspread wings pushing ahead of them a wall of wind that can flatten tents, sweep the thatch off roofs, snap tree branches, and tear a ship's sails from their masts.

So yes, dragons in my game-world leave contrails, and they are known among sages as "dragon-tracks" - some say that one can identify a dragon's lineage (i.e., breath weapon type) by the clouds, in fact. All dragons are capable of leaving contrails to some degree - an ancient dragon is big enough to create a pressure differential with her wingbeats, and her warm breath leaves puffy clouds as she flies through the thin cold air. Fire-breathers leave the most impressive contrails of all, their very bodies converting water vapor to clouds as they fly - in fact, when such a dragon wants to announce his presence, he might do a series of high-altitude aerobatics to fill the sky with streamers of cloud, then buzz a few villages ripping off roofs and scattering livestock.

Thanks for the replies, everyone.

 

[MavrickWeirdo]

Regarding the Wikipedia quotation above, I'm a little surprised that the wiki author specifically cited jet engines, as prop engines are capable of leaving contrails as well - I may contact the wiki editors with a few photos to get that corrected.

Just in case you didn't already know, you are a wiki editor, so you can just change it yourself.

(Wiki's are databases where anyone who uses it can update anything they choose.)

 

[jgbrowning]

In my games the only thing flying dragons tend to leave behind is entrails: PC entrails.



joe b.

 

[ssampier]

what about dragon droppings?

I imagine the flying dragon leaves a fairly large dragon doo behind.

 

[Umbran]

The atmosphere contains water (which is why rain occurs) and although most aero-engines are thought of as running on a fuel such as petrol/gasoline (piston engines) or paraffin/kerosene (jet engines) they actually use a mixture of fuel and air, the air being taken from the atmosphere. This air contains moisture in the form of water-vapour, which passes through the engine and is heated in the cylinders/combustion-chambers and emerges as superheated steam in the exhaust. For every gallon of fuel burnt, approximately one gallon of water (steam) is produced, depending on the fuel/air ratio.

Note that everything but the last sentence above is mostly irrelevant. To be more clear about it -

Yes, the engine takes in air, that that air contains water. That air and water get heated, and shot out the back of the engine. So far, the overall amount of water in the air has not increased, and the mixture is warmer when it leaves than when it entered. So far, we should end up with a lower relative humidity in the air leaving the engine - same amount of water, but higher temperature. That should discourage condensation. Even if it cools, it would only have the same water content as the other air nearby, and nothing interesting should happen.

But, aviation fuel is made of hydrocarbons. When it burns, many of the hydrogen atoms in the fuel combine with oxygen inthe air to create water. So, a whole lot of new water comes out of the engine than went into it. So, when the exhaust cools, the air can end up supersaturated with water, and condensation might occur.

 

[Mystery Man]

 

[The Shaman]

*snippy-snippy!*

And your point is...?

 

[ThirdWizard]

what about dragon droppings?

I imagine the flying dragon leaves a fairly large dragon doo behind.

Actually, I belive their bodies are such that they can fully digest even rocks.