Latvian thrillseekers complete world’s first “drone dive”

Last month Riga-based tech firm Aerones pulled off the world’s first “drone dive”, using a powerful drone to lift a skydiver 330m into the air from the top of a telecommunications tower and launching him into a parachute flight.

Aerones performed the feat in central Latvia on 12 May, when their 3.2m-wide drone picked Ingus Augstkalns up and lifted him high above the countryside. Reassuringly for Mr Augstkalns, the drone had been tested moments before, lifting and dropping a dead weight of 90kg.

“You no longer need a helicopter [to skydive]. Today we did the first drone jump, a completely new way of base jumping. It makes it possible to base jump from any place—in cities, in desert, in mountains,” Aerones CEO Jānis Putrāms told AFP.

In January this year, Aerones used the same drone to tow snowboarders across a frozen lake — “drone-boarding”.

Source: AFP