In a video posted on the Web by Seufert recently, a man digging in the muddy banks of Tern Island can be seen charging toward Seufert’s drone, rake in hand.

But instead, his unmanned aircraft became the target of an angry clammer, who was clearly displeased by the presence of the machine buzzing overhead.

When Christopher Seufert flew his drone over a small island off Chatham this month, he thought he would be capturing breathtaking images of the picturesque coastline and footage for a prospective documentary about the shellfishing industry.

The person in the video, whose face was blurred out by Seufert, suddenly launches the rake into the sky, nearly striking the device. Luckily for Seufert, the man missed.


Before posting the interaction online, Seufert, a professional photographer and filmmaker by trade, slowed down the footage and added music.

The video ends by showing the beachgoer walking to retrieve the rake.

“Once I realized that, to put it lightly, the guy didn’t want me around, I left,” Seufert said. “It was obviously a pretty surprising reaction.”

Seufert said he took the video about two weeks ago. It wasn’t the first time, he said, that he has been met by an ornery individual unhappy with the sight of his flying contraption.

“I’ve had my drone attacked twice by people on the ground hurling objects,” he said in a message to the Globe. “Though I’m as legal as you can get, there is some pretty crazy backlash happening out there.”

As drones have become more popular, concerns have been raised about the devices flying too close to aircraft, crashing to the ground in public places, and being used for snooping.

Seufert said he doesn’t yet use his drone commercially, but he has registered it with the Federal Aviation Administration, and follows all applicable regulations for recreational use. He said it’s “worth noting” that the man in the video was farming at a public resource, where there’s no expectation of privacy, and Seufert stayed the legal distance set by the FAA.


The FAA established a registration system for drones on Dec. 21. According to federal regulations, anyone who owns a drone weighing more than 0.55 lbs. but less than 55 lbs. must register the device before flying it outdoors as a hobby.

Seufert screened the footage of the rake-throwing-clammer at the Chatham Orpheum on May 18, as part of a presentation about drones, privacy, and the legal issues surrounding their use, he said.

He said the incident on the island “definitely cooks up a lot of issues and debates” about privacy and the perception of drones by the public.

The screening, which about 70 people attended, was followed by a question-and-answer session with Chatham’s police chief; Tim Howard, manager of Chatham Municipal Airport; and other local officials.

Howard said he wasn’t surprised by the man’s reaction in Seufert’s video — “We read about that kind of stuff all the time,” he said — but Seufert and others locally are doing their best to help keep people informed about the proper use of drones.

“It’s such a new technology, and there are very few rules about when it’s being used for private use and commercial use,” Howard said in an interview. “Some people think that their privacy is being invaded, and people take it as intrusive.”


Seufert, who reiterated that he was following regulations while operating the drone, hopes people can get accustomed to their use as more of the devices hit the skies.

“There are going to be so many good reasons for using these things, and I’m the type of person you want to be using them,” he said. “These things will save lives one day. . . . People will start to realize that it’s going to be all about how you use it.”

Steve Annear can be reached at steve.annear@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @steveannear.