Canyon Disaster

Kimberly and I had an interesting experience while in Texas. I thought it might be fun to have us both write it up and share so that you can get both viewpoints. Enjoy!

KIMBERLY:

While we were exploring the canyon by my Aunt Mary’s house, I remembered that we had brought my drone with us! I had gotten it as a graduation present from Aunt Maggie and Uncle Ron. We were out on one of the viewing areas when mom and I decided to try to get the drone out so we could get a picture of everyone with the view of the canyon in the background. Sounds like a good and fun idea! Now, if you know anything about drones, you probably know that they aren’t the most easiest things to use. And we don’t really know what we're doing with it yet! So we get all of the equipment that we need out to do this seemingly doable task, when mom comes up with the brilliant idea of trying to control the drone herself! Now, because I haven’t gotten a real good chance to fly it yet, I really wanted to give it a try! But because mom had apparently felt like there was pressure to get this done ASAP she was adament that she should do it by her phone, (a way that we have never tried before FYI). However, I was just as adamant that I should do it! After all, it’s my present! But since she has more muscles than me and I couldn't physically stop her, she took control and tried to do it through her phone instead of the controller. So as I watched her do it, I was a little frustrated but it was ok, I was keeping a smile on my face pretending everything was good. And then the worst thing imaginable happened. She told the drone to take off, and boy did it! It rose up in the air and took a direct shot towards the bottom of the canyon! To say I was mad was an understatement. I was furious! If only she would listen to me more! Soon after it happened we ordered the same one on Amazon so it turned out ok. It’s just frustrating to have two minds trying to do the same task sometimes, but I guess that’s normal, too. I don’t think we’ll be bringing anything like this back to the canyon anytime soon!

MARY:

Knowing we were going to the Palo Duro Canyon, I packed Kimberly's drone hoping to get a cool picture of us as a group with the canyon in the background. Kimberly got the drone as a graduation present from Aunt Maggie and Uncle Ron and although it is really cool, we just haven't gotten to use it that much. We thought this would be a perfect time. Sorry, Maggie and Ron.

So, there we were, with the beautiful canyon all around us. We got caught up with taking pictures with our phones so it was a good 15 minutes into our photo session when we remembered about the drone. I got it out of the van and started getting it ready. Unfortunately, since we haven't used it much and it's a little complicated, it was taking me a long time to get it ready for flight. Kimberly was telling me to let her do it, but in my adult wisdom, I knew I could do it faster, which seemed very important to me at the time time. It was HOT and we had already been out there for 15 - 20 minutes, so I felt the pressure to get this done quickly in order not to inconvenience the folks with us that might be more effected by the heat. Now, it's relevant to say that these folks (Dad, Aunt Mary and Aunt Julie) were not pressuring me in the least to move it along. I just felt like I should. So there's Kimberly, telling me to let her do it, and there's me, refusing to let her because I knew I could do it faster. (There's a shining moment in my life as a parent)

This drone comes with a hand controller that Kimberly can use; Maggie and Ron made sure of that. The controller attaches to your phone so you can see what the drone sees. When I thought I had the drone ready, Kimberly reminded me to attach the controller to my phone and again insisted she could do it. That's when I realized I could just control the drone with only my phone and didn't need to waste time attaching it to the controller, or so I thought. I set the drone down and told it to fly. It came up with a caution window asking me if I wanted to start the propellors. YES, just fly you dang thing so we can get this over with. Well, flew it did. It slowly raised up and off it went, zooming out into the canyon, into the abyss, never to be seen again. My dad and Aunt Julie actually had to duck to get out of its way as if flew by in order not to lose an eye or something. However, had they been willing to make that sacrifice, we may still have that drone.

Needless to say, Kimberly was pretty upset with me. I admitted that I should have let her do it, and would try to be more supportive of her doing things in the future. I told her that the next time I'm taking over on something and she is wanting to do it, just yell, "Drone!" and that should be enough to remind me of my past sins and let her do it. She doesn't think it will work, but time will tell. And don't worry everyone, Kimberly got a new drone, so all it well.