I saw that live yesterday during the World Cup Slalom in Madonna di Campiglio. A Drone suddenly stopped working and almost hit the Austrian World Champion Marcel Hirscher!
The Drone was recording the race for the company “Infront”. It had the official permission to fly in a certain “safe” corridor”. For the first part of the race it did but then suddenly the operator of the Drone decided to break the rule and fly right over the head of the Ski racers. And than it happened. The Operator lost control and the drone missed Marcel Hirscher by only 1 meter! Marcel reported that he heard something but he thought it was a person who might slipped.
Watch the video below which shows the accident in normal speed. It’s even more impressive!
Now imagine if something like that would happen on you on your kids. I guess we need some serious regulation….
Source: Orf.
6 Responses
Almost Nearly Kills ?
Reality: Multirotor nearly hit – that’s serious enough.
Media: Drone nearly killed…
Injured, yes, killed not, that is media hype. And to his advantage he wore a helmet. But we should be worried more about commercial use of drones like the nonsense amazon is planning. If they are are really planning delivering parcels with drones- might be just a clever trick to get into the media. The real danger are all the amateurs flying around with drones. Here in Europe more and more countries regulate drones very strictly. In Austria for example you need something like a pilote license and a drone with camera has to be operated by two persons.
They reach crazy high speeds during ski competition. If hit by the drone, he definitely would have been slipped. Every slip or crash during a world cup race competition can be fatal. Many athletes have been died during competition, without being hit by a drone. It’s a very dangerous sport.
Hysteria much?
He was at the slalom – say 25-30 km/h, maybe even less.
I’ve had a few motorcycle accidents, one probably above 100 km/h at the moment of landing on the asphalt – yet I haven’t even broken a bone yet.
New York Times:
“Drones Banned at World Cup Races After One Nearly Hits Marcel Hirscher”