The Lake Fire continues to rage in THe San Bernardino National Forest and Wednesday, some idiot did nothing to help the efforts of firefighters when he decided to fly a drone in the area.
Fire crews spotted the drone at about 5:30 p.m. on Wednesday evening. This forced the recall of all aircraft that was being used to take on the blaze for fear the drone might cause an accident – aircraft that normally would be dropping water and fire retardant on the blaze.
“We don’t want to deal with unknown aircraft in our airspace,” Mike Eaton, forest aviation officer for the San Bernardino National Forest told KTLA. “They’ve got enough on their mind already … difficult terrain, difficult weather, winds and other things. They don’t need to be worrying about model airplanes or drones.”
The drone was described as being orange or red and about 4 feet wide. It was being flown illegally in the area – as there is a federal temporary flight restriction in the area. It is not known who was flying the drone.
Tonight a hobby drone grounded firefighting aircraft by flying over the #LakeFire. When you fly…we CAN'T! Puts our pilots lives at risk.
— CAL FIRE PIO (@CALFIRE_PIO) June 25, 2015
UNMANNED AIRCRAFT OR DRONES ARE NOT PERMITTED ANYWHERE NEAR AN ACTIVE FIRE – DO NOT HAMPER FIREFIGHTING OPERATIONS pic.twitter.com/5ULffK1MIf
— San Bernardino NF (@SanBernardinoNF) June 25, 2015
