Six Rivers National Forest - Undisclosed Location

This flight took off from one ridgeline and across a deep valley to another ridgeline to the north.
On the side of the second ridgeline lays a pond all but hidden from view unless you are right over it.

The pond is about 700 feet below the original take off elevation so descending to the pond surface puts the drone at "negative elevation".

The tall conifer trees surrounding the pond make maintaining radio link with the drone tricky. You will see I descended in 3 or 4 stages with each time getting lower as I confirmed I could keep a radio link.

My main goal was to survey the muddy bankside for tracks due to the special location of this pond.

Bluff Creek is the largest/deep valley you see best to the right/upper-right (west) on the return to home trip. All the valleys/ravines seen in the video end up flowing to Bluff Creek.

It is a risky mission where the drone would have been unrecoverable in virtually all the trip should it had gone down. Upon returning to the home take off area I flew it around a little bit casually just to reduce the stress; I could literally hear my heart beating while descending on the pond. I've flown this mission several times now on a number of trips to the area and it still scares me each time.

For more information please email me at Sarasota_Steve at Hotmail.com