Russia’s Ridus News Agency recently published an impressive series of hexacopter aerial shots of the demonstrations in Moscow’s Bolotnaya Square on December 10th.
Onlookers may have thought it was the police monitoring the security situation on the scene of mass protests, but in fact the UAS camera was launched by the Ridus news agency.
Photo: RT
Ridus describes itself as an independent community of “civilian journalists”, as they tend to call themselves, which is becoming increasingly popular among Russian bloggers, with anyone potentially being able to contribute to their news reports.
The police meanwhile was monitoring events via helicopter hovering above Bolotnaya Square.
Official figures quoted a crowd of 25,000, whilst other estimates ranged between 40,000 and -70,000.
[Comment by Peter van Blyenburgh, UVS International: Just as in many other countries, the value of using Small UAS is apparently also being recognized by “non-traditional” customers in the Russian Federation. It is hoped that the Russian Ministry of Transport is taking the necessary action to create and implement the required rules and regulations covering the use of Small UAS for such applications.]