Ever wish Angry Birds was a real thing? Last month, a man was flying his camera-equipped drone over the Australian countryside when suddenly the airborne machine was plucked out of the sky. The footage survived but the damage was done: It took Adam Lancaster more than a $100 to repair the drone.
The culprit? A Wedge-Tailed eagle, which came out of nowhere to "punch" the drone out of the sky. The short clip shows the eagle popping up and dispatching the machine in a matter of seconds. According to an interview Lancaster gave to ABC, the eagle continued to hover over the downed drone afterwards to make sure it had got the message.
This is not the first case of drones getting hit by raptors in the sky. A year ago Christopher Schmidt was flying his quadcopter at Magazine Beach Park in Cambridge, Massachusetts and his drone also had a wild encounter with a bird. "As far as I could tell, the juvenile red-tailed hawk came out unscathed, and having defeated his prey, was happy to retreat. (As soon as he flew at me, I throttled down the props to try to minimize any harm to the bird.) The quadcopter came out unscathed as well."
“[The] eagle was fine. She was massive and used talons to 'punch' the drone out of the sky," wrote Lancaster who is a drone photographer in his video description online. “Do not fly drones near birds of prey; they clearly attack seeing you as a threat or the right sized dinner. This will cost you money and potentially harm to the bird. This one was fine, the drone needed some attention before it could fly again."
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