You can’t observe without being part of what you’re observing. Pity the drone operator didn’t realize that.
I think he realized it a little too well, albeit ex post.
Poor little copter…
The guys a dick, no question, if only for flying a buzzyass drone around and disturbing the peace and quiet. But at 160 feet deep and 500 gallons of near boiling water per minute, I think the only drones likely to cause damage are operated by the US military.
And at the risk of being a geology didact - it’s not a geyser, it’s a geothermal spring.
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Probably at the very least because they do not likely know who it was.
Isn’t a geyser a geothermal spring with indigestion?
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Kinda slim on details to label the guy “stupid” or “a moron”. Accidents happen. It could have been completely unintentional and an accident, with something going wrong with the RC vehicle.
fireworks are not fragile rare ecosystems, nor are they unique environments, nor are they public sidewalks.
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I’m not sure how he could “unintentionally” illegally fly an RC copter in a national park. Him putting it in the air at all - in a place where no permits are allowed for unmanned vehicles - was stupid. Him having an accident with it just means he didn’t get away with his stupid, illegal act — and made it harder for the Park Service to actually be able to permit anyone else in future.
While the rules are in effect, drones cannot be launched from, landed in or flown over the land or water overseen by the agency, which manages 84 million acres of land and 4.5 million acres of oceans, lakes and reservoirs.
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Before this article, I would have no idea that you couldn’t run RC planes and stuff in National Parks. Lots of wide open spaces, one would think they would be a good area for that.
I understand ignorance of the law is no defense, but I can see someone doing this with no idea that it was illegal.
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And they would be dumb for doing it. The Park Service is really good about making themselves available for questions. People know that there are restrictions on flying RC’s - so to not check first in a national park would be as dumb as not checking before fishing a river.
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And yet - snowmobiles are authorized all over the place. This thing is like 2 pounds of plastic. Better it not be lost or in the stream but far from a disaster or the worse thing dropped in the park. Should we not ban all bags and things carried in case they are left behind? Quads are no worse.
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Further miniaturization of the devices will make it moot anyway - both from the point of possible harm done (size and noise comparable with a big (okay, really big but still) insect, amount of trash even in case of total loss rather minuscule) and of enforcement (if it is too small to spot, tough luck finding out that it flew at all, and if cheap enough to sacrifice it if needed it is cheaper to not admit its use and lose it even if caught, under certain scenarios).
Check out the military developments, and realize the state-of-the-art there today will be in toy stores tomorrow.
@perryjefferies - Because of problems from snowmobiles, new rules were passed for the number allowed in the parks, how loud they could be, and what their exhaust could be like. I totally agree that they’re a problem, and for years the Park Service has been dealing with it.
It’s not just the size of the trash that’s the problem - it’s where it can get to.
Sorry, @shaddack size doesn’t fix it. Coins have been big enough to block hot springs, and removing them has been damaging. So the problem will still exist as a problem if someone flies over and crashes. Basically, the NPS will most likely have to step up not just enforcement, but also information about why flyovers of certain things are really bad news.
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Size does greatly alleviate it. Not crashing a vehicle into a spring/geyser will also completely alleviate the problem, and the information about why the flyovers are a bad idea will make it more likely for less experienced pilots to avoid trouble.
It’s also not likely a single coin that causes problems; it is an accumulated amount of coins and other trash, at least according to the link I found earlier.
It’s not like that people want to intentionally crash drones there anyway. I guess people throwing in rocks just for fun are a bigger problem and unmanned vehicles will stay only a negligible fraction of total volume of trash deposited in such places.
They made a decision regarding the law a few months back IIRC.
Confirmation: I do RC
Also: put me in the ‘meh’ category. Obviously this guy needs some damn flying lessons, and (thanks to the helpful boingers in this thread) I now understand and accept the practical concerns about the careful chemical balance of geysers and cave pools, but the guy’s clearly a fool with no respect.
Most photographers are meticulously careful not to leave anything, not even a “fun” size chocolate bar wrapper. Who would have thought one of America’s most popular tourist destinations would have a contingent of asshole idiots who don’t know what they’re doing?
Also, I’m not totally sure but I’d guess that the photograph of the Grand Prismatic Spring used in this post to tell us about the stoopid guy breaking the sacrosanct “no drones in National Parks” law was taken using a drone.
I for one would like to see a low-level drone flyover video of the geyser but I’m perfectly happy to let someone who knows what they’re doing do it and I’ll just watch it in HD on teh connected series of yourtubes.
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That’s the (IMO) perfectly reasonable concern that the parks have. Some of them contain things like extremely rare birds nesting too high to get a shot of from the ground - but hey, with an RC you could get right up there!
People aren’t all considerate and smart. I also shoot photographs, and I shoot outdoors. I only shoot where it’s allowed, and I do my best to not disturb what was there before I showed up — but I am happy to be turned away if needed.
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Didn’t the park used to have a problem with people throwing their laundry into Old Faithful?
All true, yet neither are fireworks displays authorized for fly throughs by an RC camera copter. The fireworks was merely the most recent “drone” footage I recall, and merely one of many such shots happily featured on BB. Acting all concerned about this crash after all the pro “drone” hype is a bit much.
Granted, I, too, in hind sight modem think the crash was a bad thing. But I’d have cheered on the spectacular fly through of the geyser if it had worked. I don’t have an entirely consistent position on this yet, and neither does BB.
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