Activists release video of drone being shot down

The activist group whose drone was shot down by hunters on Sunday, Nov. 19 has released video of the incident.

A drone owned by SHARK, or SHowing Animals Respect and Kindness, was flying above the Wing Pointe club in Berks County, Penn. and observing a pigeon shooting event when it came under fire.

“As soon as I hit the go home mode, because the GPS and compasses were damaged, it went crazy,” said Steve Hindi, SHARK president and the pilot of the drone, in a phone interview with sUASNews on Monday.

The footage cuts to the drone’s ground control station, which includes a laptop computer and an additional monitor. About the 1:37 mark, shot rings out and Steve Hindi can be heard saying “That sounded different; I’m bringing it back.”

Hindi manually flies the damaged drone in for  a landing.

On the ground, the octocopter begins smoking, and a member of the animal rights group approaches the drone, detaches its battery, and throws it aside.

sUASNews reported the incident Monday, which was the fourth time SHARK lost a drone from gunfire.

Matthew Schroyer is a drone journalist and founder of DroneJournalism.org. He can be reached at [email protected], or on Twitter as @matthew_ryan