Bottom line ... lost visual, heavy sun glare on iPad and last visual I was on the right course headed back down, approach angle however put me somehow threading a crazy needle through a set of powerlines.

Lessons Learned:
Fly with a spotter from now on, no exceptions
Get a glare guard for my iPad
Stop playing the lottery, cause I will never be that lucky again

Wow, amazing that you got away unscaved!  Great lessons learned!

Geeeeeeezzzz. That was lucky. Bit of a brown pants moment

Wow, close one...

Wow!!!  That is so sick!!! lol Close!  Glad you got it back safe and thanks for sharing the video

Man you couldn't pull that maneuver off with 100 attempts.............................pure luck

Oh Cr--  Too Close!  But I did see the Piasa Bird on the cliff!   I Worked as a Land Surveyor just down river on the Clarke Bridge from 1990 - 1994.   Beatiful area.

Sir Edward K Posted at 2015-10-19 12:22
Oh Cr--  Too Close!  But I did see the Piasa Bird on the cliff!   I Worked as a Land Surveyor just d ...

Amazing.
It also seems the drone is not affected at all by the powerline.
Is this the case?
I wonder because I sometimes fly close (~10-20 m) to powerlines.

Nice. Thanks for sharing!

rene.vandermeer Posted at 2015-10-19 06:52
Amazing.
It also seems the drone is not affected at all by the powerline.
Is this the case?

I have a modest tower (50 feet) for my amateur radio. I was checking out video lag the other day and intentionally let my quad get close to one of the guy wires. Most of the guy wire is made of phillystran (specialized plastic/carbon fiber), but the lower 10 - 15 feet is steel. (Protection against brush fires and vandalism.)

My quad got within about 5 feet of the steel part of the guy and the lights flashed and I got a compass error. That short piece of cable is not very big and there's no current at all, but it affected the compass. Lesson learned.

Art Burke - N4PJ
Leesburg, FL

Count your Blessings!

WOW! That was super cool!!! Should go viral

Good grief! That was frightening to say the least!!!

WOW - Powerlines are very hard to spot.

Normally, once you are on-top off them you have had it!

Wow!  Lucky!!!

Yes, still today I am watching this and realizing how lucky I was. Ordered a shield for the iPad today.  Learned that lesson.

For those who missed it.  I posted a similar event a while back...



Wires above!  Wires below!  I threaded a 4 foot openeing.


Lesson learned.  Make sure you pre-plan your flights carefully and set your RTH alttitude well above all obsticles.

And i thought i was close

The only wire for mile around and I just missed it.  comes at about 30 secs in. You can see how I am taking my time to decide: "do I go under it or do I go over it?"

This almost gave me a panic attack watching it.

Regarless, this dispels that goofy comment too often thrown out by folks when commenting on someone's crash...
"Were you flying close to power lines?... this could definately disrupt the signal of the blah, blah causing interference with the blah, blah, blah...."

ItalyDreamHomes Posted at 2015-10-20 06:49
The only wire for mile around and I just missed it.  comes at about 30 secs in. You can see how I am ...

Beautiful. I've never seen actual footage from the Shire.

Hey!!! The Piasa Bird Alton...lol

I'm from across the river in Kirkwood and drive the river road often to head up to the Whitman Hotel in Brussels.... I liked to old metal Piasa bird  down the road better . Luck was with you.

Butch

wow that was close

Now that was close. Glad you got it back ok.

Happened to me too recently. Narrow valley where is my sister's cottage. I went over 100m (for safety) flying backwards due to the sun. Never noticed that across the valley it 22kV powerline in that height..
Beginners' luck

And I thought I am the only one

You are very very lucky, mate! Hope next time you should overlook and pay more attention to the flight course

This is why I get a little pissed when Monday-morning Quarterbacks start openly blasting a person who's sharing their crash/near-miss video - I learn (or re-learn) more from watching these videos than reading any text in a manual.  Yeah, some knuckleheads deserve a good virtual slap across the cheek, but you can tell who's remaining stead-fast arrogant, and who's putting themselves out there just to help remind us all to not forget the basics.

No need for "I told you so" type comments, the person already knows.  That said, I must admit I do enjoy a good old "RTFM" gang-tackle reply from time to time.  

Geez, watching these videos is like watching a monster movie;  We can see the wires.  Why doesn't the pilot turn?  They're getting closer ... closer.  "Turn" we yell at the monitor.  But it's too late, there's no where to go - the pilot's fully committed.  We cringe as the wires pass within inches, then sigh in relief and swear that will never, ever happen to us.  Until it does ....

Absolutely ... I have learned a lot from folks posting up both the Good and the Bad. I got the Phantom 3 as a trial for a trade up to the Inspire One X5r. Most of my video and content is capturing events and family outings with no real goal of commercializing it.

Oh gosh!! That was way to close to make it out "alive"!!