Yesterday I was flying my P4 over my apartment building in Sherman Oaks, CA, and had the drone about a block away (over Ventura Blvd) when a helicopter flew overhead at a pretty low altitude (over me, not the drone). The first thing I did was freeze and try to get a visual on the helicopter's location (first with my own eyes, then with the P4) and through the P4 camera I could see the heli go into a search orbit a few blocks away. I then knew it was an LAPD bird, so I lowered my altitude down to about 100 ft and headed back to my building to land ASAP.
While I was doing this, an LAPD cruiser stopped at the end of my street, close to where I was standing, and then backed up to stop near my side of the sidewalk. I thought "oh ****... I'm about to get busted for interfering with the airspace of a LAPD helicopter" so I turned around and started walking back toward my building, thinking I could land in the interior courtyard and then hide out in my apt before the cops would see where the drone went.
But as soon as I started walking away, a cop jumped out of the car and yelled out to me, "Hey, I see you're flying a drone there." "Umm... yeah" I replied, thinking I was about to get into some kind of trouble. I was about to start explaining that I was just trying to land because I saw a helicopter fly by and didn't want to interfere with it. But before I could say anything, the cop said "Is there any chance your drone got footage of a black van driving by? Are you recording? Is there any chance we can see the footage you're shooting?" I said sure, and then brought it in to land, while the cop started asking me friendly questions about it, like "Is it hard to control? How much did it cost?" etc.
I landed and played back some footage I just shot (through my iPhone), but it was hard to identify cars and he decided the footage wasn't of much use, and thanked me anyway. I said sorry, I wasn't paying much attention to the cars driving past as my eyes were focused on flying my drone, so I didn't see the black van they were looking for.
So, that was the end of the encounter with LAPD, and I was going to post about it here along with the footage of the whole thing... BUT... just now, after I uploaded to YouTube, I think I may see the black van they were looking for! One minute into the video, you'll see someone running on the sidewalk outside the Ralph's grocery store / Wells Fargo bank, and then jump into a black minivan that was parked in the truck loading area (closed off to public) and start turning around before I fly over and the minivan goes out of frame. I can't help but wonder if that was the suspect they were looking for... Take a look at the video and let me know what you think... should I call LAPD and tell them I might have footage of the black van they were looking for?
While I was doing this, an LAPD cruiser stopped at the end of my street, close to where I was standing, and then backed up to stop near my side of the sidewalk. I thought "oh ****... I'm about to get busted for interfering with the airspace of a LAPD helicopter" so I turned around and started walking back toward my building, thinking I could land in the interior courtyard and then hide out in my apt before the cops would see where the drone went.
But as soon as I started walking away, a cop jumped out of the car and yelled out to me, "Hey, I see you're flying a drone there." "Umm... yeah" I replied, thinking I was about to get into some kind of trouble. I was about to start explaining that I was just trying to land because I saw a helicopter fly by and didn't want to interfere with it. But before I could say anything, the cop said "Is there any chance your drone got footage of a black van driving by? Are you recording? Is there any chance we can see the footage you're shooting?" I said sure, and then brought it in to land, while the cop started asking me friendly questions about it, like "Is it hard to control? How much did it cost?" etc.
I landed and played back some footage I just shot (through my iPhone), but it was hard to identify cars and he decided the footage wasn't of much use, and thanked me anyway. I said sorry, I wasn't paying much attention to the cars driving past as my eyes were focused on flying my drone, so I didn't see the black van they were looking for.
So, that was the end of the encounter with LAPD, and I was going to post about it here along with the footage of the whole thing... BUT... just now, after I uploaded to YouTube, I think I may see the black van they were looking for! One minute into the video, you'll see someone running on the sidewalk outside the Ralph's grocery store / Wells Fargo bank, and then jump into a black minivan that was parked in the truck loading area (closed off to public) and start turning around before I fly over and the minivan goes out of frame. I can't help but wonder if that was the suspect they were looking for... Take a look at the video and let me know what you think... should I call LAPD and tell them I might have footage of the black van they were looking for?
