Drones are well-known for their incredible images from angles no human could take while holding a camera, and they are also known for the nuisance they can cause in public spaces. However, Steve Fines has proven that the device can also save lives. Fines, a commercial drone photographer, used his thermal drone camera to help find a six-year-old boy who got lost in the woods with his dog.
The young boy, Ethan Haus, went missing after school when he got back home. He and his siblings got off the bus together, but not long after, he ran into the woods with his dog, Remington. After hours passed and the boy didn’t return, it was apparent he got lost. The Sherburne County Sheriff’s Office requested volunteers to meet at a checkpoint to plan out the search and form search teams. Soon enough, the entire community of Sherburne county, Minnesota, came together in hopes of finding the boy.
Fines was among over 600 volunteers who searched tirelessly for 10 hours while temperatures dropped to below 30°F (-1.1°C). The photographer found out about the boy while he was scrolling through Twitter. Luckily, Fines lived near the area where the Sheriff’s Office asked volunteers to gather, and he also knows the area very well. The area is filled with cornfields and swampy woods with ankle-deep water, which is not at all ideal conditions for a child to be in the cold and dark.
Fortunately, Fines owns a $30,000 drone that has a thermal camera, and he is an expert with finding living things in the woods at night with it. One of Fines jobs is to help farmers find runaway livestock by pinpointing their body heat. He was hoping to find Ethan the same way.
Around 10 pm, Fines began to fly his drone, and a few minutes later, he saw something on his screen. When volunteers arrived at the spot, they found three otters, which was a big disappointment. However, they didn’t give up. Over several hours, Fines spotted several creatures, including raccoons, deer, and even a bear, but no boy.
Fines said: “Nobody was losing hope. Nobody was going home.”
Around 1:40 am, Fines was able to locate Ethan and Remington using information that ground volunteers had given him. He informed rescuers where the boy was, and they quickly went over to the spot.
Fines describes as he was watching on his monitor:
I could see the four heat spots approaching. When they got about 50 feet away, I saw the dog get up and start running around. Then you could see one of the rescuers run up to the boy and pick him up.
At that moment, he knew that they found Ethan. The photographer had to sit still for a few minutes, just enjoying the moment because finding this young boy was an extraordinary moment for him. However, the moment wasn’t only special to him but the whole community too. Fines heard a chorus of 600 hooting and happy screaming people. There were shouts of joy from the cornfields. “It was the middle of the night and sound carries. You could hear people from a mile away. I’m not kidding,” he said.
After 10 hours in the freezing cold, Ethan was found lying down and shivering in a cornfield with his dog at his side. The sheriff suspects that the boy’s best friend, his dog, kept him calm on his long scary journey. Luckily, Ethan was unharmed and was able to thank everyone who helped find him.
Ethan said into the camera: “Thank you for finding me! You make my heart full!”
Many people are hailing Fines as a hero, but he quickly points out that it wasn’t only him, it was a group effort that made it possible to find Ethan.
Fines wrote:
While I was running the camera that found him and some of the news stories have focused on that, I only knew in which direction to look because volunteers on the ground had found a footprint that pointed me in the right direction. I knew which areas had already been searched because of the excellent coordination of the Sherburne County Sheriff. I had other volunteers running radios to coordinate ground search parties—the people moving across really rough ground to find him. There were 600 of us that found Ethan that night.
The Sherburne County Sheriff was impressed with the successful results using the drone and has announced that the department is going to purchase their own.
