HughPickens.com [hughpickens.com] writes:
NBC reports that defending World Cup champion Marcel Hirscher, who won silver in the slalom at the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics,
had a lucky escape after he narrowly avoided being hit by a falling drone [cnn.com]. Hirscher was on his second run in a World Cup slalom race at Madonna di Campiglio in Italy when a remote-controlled drone with a mounted camera slammed down on the piste inches behind him. "This is horrible," Hirscher said after the event. "This can never happen again. This can be a serious injury." The International Ski Federation (FIS) released a statement on its website
apologizing for the "unfortunate accident." [fis-ski.com] But some saw the lighter side announcing that the drone wars had shifted to the ski slopes. "Man,
I'd watch a lot more winter sports if this was a standard part of the game [twitter.com]," tweeted Marc Andreessen. The company responsible for the drone, sports marketing agency Infront, said its initial investigation "indicates a malfunction of the drone." "The most likely reason is a
strong and unforeseen interference on the operating frequency [chicagotribune.com], leading to limited operability," Infront said in a statement. "The pilot followed the official security procedure, purposely flying the drone as close as possible to the ground before releasing it. The aim was to destroy the drone, in order to prevent it from losing control."
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