If there were ever a drone video to make you laugh and then pause in fright of what could have happened, this would be it. Redditor ED209 shared a video of a hiker resting on top of a mountain with friends.
In the video, the drone operator has his drone filming him and the others from a point out over the precipice. The drone is recording the footage while the man uses his phone to control it (he’s using the dji drone app).
Believing his drone is all set, he leans back to relax and places his phone next to him on the rocks. But that’s when his phone begins to slide down the rock face. The drone pulls back, somehow set to pan out while recording the man frantically trying to grab his phone as it heads towards the cliff’s edge. Will he make it in time?
Watch the video below. Note it may take a few seconds for it to load.
Does the hiker succeed? No, he doesn’t get the phone in time and wisely stops in his tracks rather than get too close to the mountain’s edge.
The phone plummeted 1000 feet apparently, according to the drone’s operator. The footage which was recorded at Looking Glass Rock in North Carolina has elicited both laughter and serious commentary on the reddit post. One person wrote, “Haha I’m glad he chose life…but I wasn’t sure there for a second….”
Some redditors were quick to point out the dangers of such a situation. redditor Wolfszeit wrote, “I know someone that died from exactly this kind of situation. Someone’s backpack slid away, and he ran after it (it wasn’t even his backpack). Backpack ended up on the bottom of the mountain, with him flying after it. Honestly people; when you drop something on a mountain-hike… just let it go. I mean, sure; you can attempt to grab it from your position, but most of the time no content of any backpack is worth running after it,” wrote another.”
But how did the hiker even get this video uploaded if his drone and phone were lost? As it turns out the man was able to retrieve both his phone and the drone, which has an auto-land feature! ED209 said “he got the phone back. I don’t know about the condition of said phone.” However, the drone and its onboard SD card were in good enough condition to be able to share this video. A fortunate end to an unfortunate accident.
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