We’re taking a trip back to Iceland for more epic volcano footage.
This time it is quite unique, however, as one DJI drone demonstrates its mettle in the harshest of environments.
PetaPixel reports that Daniel Haussmann was among those photographers and videographers in Iceland that were lucky enough to get a glimpse of an erupting volcano.
But he has the distinction of owning the only drone to get hit by lava and keep on going.
Lava hit his DJI FPV but it kept on recording and we are the beneficiaries of that.
You can view the video here.
“The project, in general, was to capture the magnificent eruption in Iceland as much by drone as possible…I have chased volcanoes since the 2014 Holuhraun eruption in Iceland. Since then, I have visited various volcanic eruptions around the world, Stromboli and Etna in southern Italy, Kilauea in Hawaii, and Erta Ale volcano in the Danakil Depression in Ethiopia. I was set to also visit the Yasur volcano in the South Pacific in 2020, but this trip had to be canceled because of the pandemic,” he told PetaPixel.
So how did the drone survive such an encounter? Haussmann has a theory. Basically, he thinks the lava was still too soft to do any real damage to the drone aside from aesthetic damage.
“My theory is that the piece it hit was still soft and therefore it only caused some scratches or burn marks on the plastic and did not actually break the arms that are as seen in other crashes…The interesting thing is that I see there are some red marks, too. I guess I was also lucky that the piece did not hit the propellers or the camera.”
Have you checked out our coverage of the Iceland volcano? You can read those articles here in case you missed them.
Don’t forget to check out some of our other photography news on Light Stalking at this link right here.
