What power you captured! Looked like three trains with the third being pulled by three (or four) locomotives. Too many cars and flatbeds to count. (Did you? Over 100?) Seemed endless. Great videography.
Luckily, I found and planned a great place to fly from. As you can see from the video, there were no trees or obstacles around ... that way I could keep the drone at 100 to 125 feet without worrying about flying backwards, or in any direction and hitting something. Plus I had a good length of rail line visible to be able to show the size and power of these transcontinental trains.
Also figured out a little trick ... there is a live webcam at the Flagstaff Amtrak station ... once I saw the train pass there, I knew I had 12 to 13 minutes before it came into view at my location, and at that time the train was going downhill at 50 to 60 mph.
This timing allowed me to have time to launch my
M2P, get it in position, and still be at a good battery level to capture the whole train safely.
Same thing with the other direction ... when the crossing would ring, I knew because the trains were going uphill, I would have about 60 to 90 seconds to get into position, so I would get the
M2P airborne, fly out as fast as I could, then flip 180 degrees to capture the trains going uphill.
Missed other opportunities till I figured this out ... will be going back in the future, probably when there is some snow on the group to give a different look, but know I know how to time the trains to maximize flight time.
