re: Game of Thrones S7 E6 "Beyond The Wall" MAESTERS THREAD NO SPOILERS

I just posted this in the Hodor thread but I think it may be a useful post here too.

Here's part of a post someone made on another board 4 years using actual carrier pigeon speed to give an idea about raven speed. It was pointed out that IRL Ravens actually fly about half as fast as pigeons, but most felt Westerosi Ravens are as fast or faster than pigeons since Maester Aemon pointed they are the chosen messenger bird because they are a stronger flyer.

quote:

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So, how fast are homing pigeons? Well, here are a few extracts from various online sources.

… Flights as long as 1,100 miles have been recorded by birds in competitive pigeon racing. Their average flying speed over moderate distances (about 500 miles) is around 50 mph, but speeds of up to 58.7 mph have been observed in top racers for short distances (99 miles). …

… In Great Britain distances of over 723 miles have been flown on the day, by pigeons flying home from Nantes in western France to Fraserburgh in Scotland. Released at 0600 hrs in the morning the birds have been timed in their lofts before 10.00 at night.

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LINK /

If you compare Fraserburgh Scotland's location on Britain, it's actually in a very similar location as Eastwatch is on Westeros. Dragonstone is about the middle of the island and Nantes France is further from mid-Britain than mid-Britain is from Fraserburgh. So if it took a pigeon 16 hours to go from Nantes to Fraserburgh, it seems reasonable that a similarly fast raven could go from Eastwatch to Dragonstone in less than 8 hours, maybe even closer to 6 if my eyeballing distance is close to accurate. Allow 1-2 hours for Gendry's sprint, 6 hours for the raven and another 2-3 hours for Dany to gear up and the dragons to fly to Eastwatch. That's about 9-12 hours total. A bit longer than I felt time had passed on the show, but not an unreasonable amount of time for the standoff to have lasted.