Drones Hinder Firefighting Efforts In California

Drones are great for capturing footage at angles and heights most people would normally not be able to achieve. This can result in some spectacular scenes, but kind of like how people stop and crowd around the scene of an accident with their smartphones whipped out, drone pilots are now doing the same.

According to a report from NBC Los Angeles, it seems that during a recent wildfire in San Bernardino County, drone owners were eager to get some footage of the scene and their enthusiasm actually ended up hindering the efforts of firefighters who were forced to ground their planes and helicopters as the drones were actually in the way of them delivering their payloads.

The US Forest Service’s John Miller spoke about the dangers of the drones in that situation saying, “It can kill our firefighters in the air… They can strike one of these things and one of our aircraft could go down, killing the firefighters in the air. This is serious to us. It is a serious, not only life threat, not only to our firefighters in the air, but when we look at the vehicles that were overrun by fire, it was definitely a life-safety threat to the motorists on Interstate 15.”

This is also not the first time that a drone has hindered firefighting efforts, although to be fair while sometimes drones can get in the way, they can also be used for good, like for rescue services as we have seen in the past.

Tyler Lee
Categories: Robots
Tags: Drones