NBC reaches out to Wallaceburg native

It’s not every day NBC news calls a Wallaceburg resident to contribute to its nightly newscast.

It’s even more rare when that person declines.

But that’s what happened this week when the major American network called Brent Foster to ask him to shoot some aerial footage of the frozen Niagara Falls.

“We received a call directly from their offices in New York for the assignment,” Foster said in an interview this morning. “At first, we said no, as we had only considered using our bigger copter.”

He said using the bigger unit would require an application with Transport Canada for flights, and a Special Flight Operations Certificate, which would have delayed the project.

“After politely declining, we reviewed the guidelines that Transport Canada has issued for smaller copters, and realized we met the exemptions to fly the flight with our smaller unit, so we called them back and accepted,” he said.

The 1:45 segment aired Wednesday night.

Click here to see NBC’s story.

Although he’s an internationally acclaimed photographer whose resume includes working for such news outlets as the Los Angeles Times and the National Post, he said, “This was the first time I had ever heard from NBC, so it came out of the blue as a total surprise.”

Foster used a DJI Phantom 2 with a Go Pro Hero 4 camera on board and launched from a clear spot near the falls and away from crowds. He did a total of three flights.

“We kept people more than 100 feet away for take off and landing and did three total flights. Each flight was a little over five minutes. Batteries allow for 25 minutes, but we wanted to make sure we were safe in the cold conditions,” he said.

Safety was paramount.

“I had an observer with me as well to keep an eye on the sky as well as to watch for any possible pedestrians when taking off and landing to keep them more than 100 feet away.”

Although Foster makes the flight appear easy, he said he’s spent a lot of time training on how to fly the drones.

“Flying takes a lot of time and training. You can’t just buy a UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) and put it up in the air. They’re not toys.”