Freeze Up/Break Up

[Chrislaf]

Here's a short video showing the freeze up and then the break up of the ice on the bay of a local lake. The weather in the area was cold and now it has turned mild for the next few days. There are three lakes near where I live. The two smaller ones have been frozen over for a couple of weeks now and will stay frozen even with this mild weather, since the ice is now thick enough. However the lake closest to where I live (walking distance) is a large lake and it has been years since it has frozen over in December. It started freezing early this year but the mild weather has put that process on hold for now.

The day I flew my NEO over the broken ice there was a strong wind coming off the lake and the NEO struggled a bit. I kept getting wind warnings so did not fly far. The wind was about 27km/h (7.5m/s) so it was near it's limit in sport mode (8m/s).

Chris

 

[NeoNeo]

So far, looks like another mild early Winter even in colder Canada. Real mild down here just S of the border. Most day time highs have been running 5-10C above normal. At least you have full snow cover. Down at Lake (Superior) level there has been bare ground showing on any S facing surface since a few days ago. Rained couple days ago. Snowpac at elevation is down to a few centimeters.

Getting almost too late in the season for ice to form on L. Superior. The Bay south of here (~150 sq km/55sq miles) is shallow(10 meter max depth) and usually freezes over. Almost January and the ice is looking more like what you captured in your video. One strong NE swell and what solid sections of ice there is will look like the floating slabs in your video. Then like most years. Water rescue service will be collecting floaters (aka ice fishing fools).

 

[Chrislaf]

Then like most years. Water rescue service will be collecting floaters (aka ice fishing fools).

That's happened here too but mostly in the spring when people stay out on the ice too long. Last year when the bay froze up in late January, there were people out there 2 days later ice fishing - couldn't believe it!

Chris

 

[Droning on and on...]

The day I flew my NEO over the broken ice there was a strong wind coming off the lake and the NEO struggled a bit. I kept getting wind warnings so did not fly far. The wind was about 27km/h (7.5m/s) so it was near it's limit in sport mode (8m/s).

Chuckle. Not far, eh?... Seems in this instance 10m is no better than 300... I mean if it goes down, and temptingly is sitting on an ice floe, it's not like you're gonna walk out there either way...

Psychology.

We've been having some spectacular storm weather here in Santa Cruz the last week. Some big disaster events... 150ft of the end of the warf collapsed into the ocean. Huge surf, beaches literally washed away.

A building exploded in the Capitola Village a few days ago. Gas leak. Miraculously no one was hurt.

I've been itching to throw the Neo up and capture some of this. And for some reason I'm wimping out worried about the rain, crashing, just feeling wimpy for some reason

I pledge to my friends here I will go FPV some of that stuff and post it here. I'm not made of money, but I think I can risk $200 to get some awesome footage. Buck up, Dave

 

[RcHawks]

Nicely none. We've had heavy fog here for the last 4 days.

 

[Chrislaf]

Chuckle. Not far, eh?... Seems in this instance 10m is no better than 300... I mean if it goes down, and temptingly is sitting on an ice floe, it's not like you're gonna walk out there either way...

Psychology.

We've been having some spectacular storm weather here in Santa Cruz the last week. Some big disaster events... 150ft of the end of the warf collapsed into the ocean. Huge surf, beaches literally washed away.

A building exploded in the Capitola Village a few days ago. Gas leak. Miraculously no one was hurt.

I've been itching to throw the Neo up and capture some of this. And for some reason I'm wimping out worried about the rain, crashing, just feeling wimpy for some reason

I pledge to my friends here I will go FPV some of that stuff and post it here. I'm not made of money, but I think I can risk $200 to get some awesome footage. Buck up, Dave

Yes, if it went down even in the few days when the ice was forming, I would not be able to go out there and try to retrieve it as the ice is way too thin to support anyone. It's almost worse if your drone goes down on thin ice than if it goes down in open water because you could see it on the ice.

Wow! That's some crazy weather. It seems more extreme weather events are happening these days.

I find that due to the cost of the NEO I am willing to take more risks with it. Still don't want to loose it and will continue to fly responsibly but I do wish I would have stayed in the air a little longer and maybe flew a littler further on that windy day when the ice had broken up because the motion of the waves and the ice made for some cool shots.

Chris

 

[NeoNeo]

Local ski hill was advertising "Spring Skiing in December". When snowboarding mid-day. Needed to wait for the fog to lift. +1C, no wind, snow corned up really nice. Spring skiing. First day I've seen the sun since???? Fog or heavy clouds for days since before Christmas.



I use the ice fisherman as test dummies for more or less guessing how thick the ice is. If I see snowmobiles, trucks, atvs it's probably relatively safe ice. Use to do my range tests out on the ice. Luckily in the old days ~2km was the limit of our then restricted to 25mWatt VTX. Last few years. Range test would have ended with the quad taking a swim.