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flying in hawaii big island & national parks

mikey201

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dont know if this is the right place to post this so i apologies before hand

has anyone flown or had experience flying on the big island of hawaii . ill be going on a trip in may and hope to get some amazing footage.
and is it also true that u can fly over national parks as long as you take off from outside the park and dont land in them ?

wondering if this is true if id be able to fly up to see the volcano from a distance, there was news of some man flying inside and got tased for running and not cooperating

also looked on the air map app and on the west side of the big island the whole coastline a little further in the water is all a national park but it says ''null'' under it.. i dont understand?
any info would be helpful
 
I was just on the big island over Christmas with my Mavic.
I talked to park rangers in the state parks and the national parks before I flew and they're ok with you flying in the state parks, but as we know, not the national parks. So, flying in Volcanos National Park is not allowed. We rented bikes in Kalapana and rode to where the lava is flowing into the ocean. The ranger there said I could fly from outside the park boundary and fly into the park as long as I was outside the park. It would be an amazing site, but it's around a mile from the park boundary to where the lava was flowing, and with the strong winds, it would be risky. Also if the drone lands in the park, it becomes the government property.
I'd suggest driving to the end or 270 on the north side of the island to the Pololu Trail Head and flying over the ocean. It's unbelievable.
Also Rainbow Falls is great for flying.

Here's a couple stills from the Pololu lookout
 

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I was just on the big island over Christmas with my Mavic.
I talked to park rangers in the state parks and the national parks before I flew and they're ok with you flying in the state parks, but as we know, not the national parks. So, flying in Volcanos National Park is not allowed. We rented bikes in Kalapana and rode to where the lava is flowing into the ocean. The ranger there said I could fly from outside the park boundary and fly into the park as long as I was outside the park. It would be an amazing site, but it's around a mile from the park boundary to where the lava was flowing, and with the strong winds, it would be risky. Also if the drone lands in the park, it becomes the government property.
I'd suggest driving to the end or 270 on the north side of the island to the Pololu Trail Head and flying over the ocean. It's unbelievable.
Also Rainbow Falls is great for flying.

Here's a couple stills from the Pololu lookout
wow looks awesome.. and thank you for that helpful info...do you know exactly where the closest point is from outside the boundary ? im trying to look on the map just in case its not to windy.
i dont think ill be going up north but just in case ill keep that in mind
 
I was there in December with my Inspire but was not permitted to fly near the lava flow as tour
helicopters fly around it all the time.
There's no where to take off from legally to film coast lines in Hawaii as it is all state or national parks!
Hawaii is a bust for drones !
 
There's a fairly new gravel road that doesn't show up on the satellite images. There's a gate about a mile from the lava flow. That gate is the boundary of the National Park.

By the way, the coast lines on the Big Island are not all state parks and regardless, a state park ranger told me that it's permitted to fly in a state park.
 
There's a fairly new gravel road that doesn't show up on the satellite images. There's a gate about a mile from the lava flow. That gate is the boundary of the National Park.

By the way, the coast lines on the Big Island are not all state parks and regardless, a state park ranger told me that it's permitted to fly in a state park.
He probably doesn't know the rules for state and National parks though.
Be careful!
 
Hawaii is a bust for drones !

My brother and his best friend, a Honolulu Police Officer for the past 17 years, live on Oahu and have Phantoms. They fly in many amazing places around the islands and have incredible drone footage from all over the state.

I think labelling Hawaii as "a bust" for drones is absolutely incorrect.
 
yea idk about bust cus ive seem some prreeeeeeetty good videos online
 
There was a bill passed in January of this year regarding drones in Hawaii. SB632.DOC
They are trying to protect the privacy and safety of people in public parks and beaches. I don't think this applies to the desolate coastlines and scenic areas of the big island that we're taking about. It could now be an issue in the state parks. I don't understand the part about interfering with the use of the park or interfering with the space above the park, though.
 
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There was a bill passed in January of this year regarding drones in Hawaii. SB632.DOC
They are trying to protect the privacy and safety of people in public parks and beaches. I don't think this applies to the desolate coastlines and scenic areas of the big island that we're taking about. It could now be an issue in the state parks. I don't understand the part about interfering with the use of the park or interfering with the space above the park, though.
This news concerned me greatly as I travel to Hawaii every year or two and am looking forward to flying my new Mavic there on the next trip. So I looked the bill up. It was NOT passed but rather deferred. It appears dead for now.

So it is still legal to fly around most beaches in Hawaii. As always, check the current law before travel. I'll keep an eye on this subject as it is very important to me and will post any important news.
 
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I'm headed to Maui next month and got the Mavic especially for this trip (sold the P3P for the portability of the Mavic). I'll be keeping an eye out on the rules/regulations and what not as well before I leave. I'm just a recreational flyer and don't have my Part 107. But my plan is to take-off in areas away from most people. Walk down the beach a bit where it looks empty and take-off. Does that sound like a good plan?

Has anyone flew out in Maui recently?
 
I'm headed to Maui next month and got the Mavic especially for this trip (sold the P3P for the portability of the Mavic). I'll be keeping an eye out on the rules/regulations and what not as well before I leave. I'm just a recreational flyer and don't have my Part 107. But my plan is to take-off in areas away from most people. Walk down the beach a bit where it looks empty and take-off. Does that sound like a good plan?

Has anyone flew out in Maui recently?
While I went to Maui in December, it was before I got the Mavic, sadly. Please post after your trip - I'd love to see what you get! It is a beautiful island with amazing beaches, even compared to the other Hawaiian islands, and not as crowded as Oahu.
 
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While I went to Maui in December, it was before I got the Mavic, sadly. Please post after your trip - I'd love to see what you get! It is a beautiful island with amazing beaches, even compared to the other Hawaiian islands, and not as crowded as Oahu.

That is what I'm hoping for, not being as crowded. Although I'm going in May, not sure if that's peak season or not. Looking so forward to it nonetheless.
 
Here's the take from somebody who just returned from Big Island. I struggled with exactly the questions you're asking while there.

First of all, there is amazing coastal sceneries and volcano fields in the island you can capture without having to worry about park boundaries. But watch the winds on the coasts, they can suddenly become very strong when you leave the land just a few 10s of meters. At one point in South Point my Mavic wasn't strong enough to fly back and was over the ocean. I thought I was going to loose it and saw it right in front of me, 50 meters or so away. It wasn't coming any closer, even in Sport mode! The way I got it back is by diving below the level of the cliff I was standing on (where the wind was slower) and flying back, then quickly jumping up above the cliff and landing.

Filming lava was on my mind all the time. I'm a big fan of our NP system but personally found the safety boundaries imposed in Volcanoes obnoxious. For instance, you can hardly see the lava in Kilauea even when the lake level is high (within 25 m below the level of the crater) because it's a mile away from Jaggar and the angle is bad -- far away from the caldera boundary, which is still a ways to the lava lake on the other side of it. On the windward side (where Jaggar is) it would still seem much safer than standing on the edge of Grand Canyon, which is perfectly legal. I thought about (and tried) launching just outside the park but the closest point, a golf course north of the crater, is >2 miles away from the lava lake, so I was at 60% battery level when I had only crossed half the caldera. Similarly with the lava ocean entry -- the safety line is so far away so it's hard to see much with bare eyes. Though it's better than the crater where you see almost nothing. Overall I'll say (and this is just my opinion) that Volcano NP's rules BEG for evasion by drone flyers and hikers ok with taking a little bit of calcuated risk (and yes, I've done extensive research on those risks and how to minimize them, and no, I didn't evade any rules myself).

The park boundary at the ocean entry is indeed about 1-1.5 miles away from the site, but VLOS is pretty good and I think it can be done. I'm still beating myself up for not trying but I was too busy encouraging/carrying my tired children. That said I took a decent video with 135mm equivalent focal length lens on a tripod from the boundary enforced by rangers. I'll be excited to hear what you report and watch the winds!

Btw I'm not encouraging this, so this is just for information disclosure purposes, but according to the guys renting the bikes in Kalapana there are no rangers at the entry before 3 pm, so you could launch launch from within the park. Also, I'm also pretty sure you could launch/land closer to Kilauea lava lake from within the boundaries without being caught, say from one of the hiking trails or from near Jaggar. But doing this could lead to tighter rules in the future, and is obviously illegal, so I didn't do it and wouldn't encourage/want others to do it.
 
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I dare anybody whose in Hawaii right now to take flight @ Pali Lookout in Honolulu.
 
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