A Christmas volcano visit for 2022

Merry Christmas everyone! I finally got around to editing together a video from drone footage I got back on November 29 when I went up to see Mauna Loa's eruption on its second full day. I flew from Puʻu Huluhulu out towards where the lava was flowing, but it was still so far away at that point that even at the limit of my signal range it didn't look all that impressive on my controller screen. Which is a shame, because it meant I didn't bother taking that much video at the closest point, whereas it actually looks fairly neat when blown up to a larger size; a good lesson to learn for the future, I suppose.

One other very cool event occurred along the way, however, which I really wanted to include in a video and is a good part of why I eventually made this one. I left the camera recording while flying out toward the lava flow, and perhaps halfway there a flock of birds appeared out of nowhere, flying and diving around and in front of my drone. I almost had a heart attack as my first thought was that they they might attack the drone, but they simply flew along with it for around half a minute before diving out of sight. I'm not sure why they decided to fly along, as I was deliberately flying nearly at my height ceiling to avoid disturbing any wildlife that might be on the ground; maybe they were just passing by and decided to follow along for fun? You can watch the video and judge for yourself:

Just to be clear, while a no-fly zone was put in place over the eruption area the next day, to the best of my knowledge this was still an acceptable flight when I did it. It's a bit disappointing to me that there wasn't any flying allowed for the rest of the eruption, but I guess the lesson to be learned is to jump on the next one quickly. Anyway, that's my Christmas present to all of you this year. I may have some more mauna*-related drone photos/videos in the not-too-distant future, but we'll see how things play out. Mele Kalikimaka, a hui hou!

*Loa and kea.