Watch falcon dive at 290kmh in BBC speed test

Trust the BBC to come up with a cool way of seeing how fast a falcon can fly. 

A BBC team took Lady, a peregrine falcon, to 3,000m in a hot air balloon to film it diving after a lure.

The lure was in the hand of a skydiver in a tandem jump with presenter Steve Leonard. 

Once on the ground, Leonard, who is a vet by training, gushed that Lady would have had to fly at more than 180mph (290kmh) to match his speed as he fell from the sky. 

"Magic...She has no style but she has ****loads of speed. 

"She's well over three times faster than a cheetah. There's nothing else that comes even close" -  BBC presenter Steve Leonard

It took six months to train Lady to be comfortable with what Leonard dubbed the ultimate test.

One can only surmise that Lady is also unwittingly a candidate for the Guinness Book of Records -- for falcon with the most hot air balloon rides.

Source: BBC, YouTube/BBC