Crowds of onlookers gathered across the street from a huge fire in Seattle’s Fremont neighborhood today, shooting pictures and video with their phones. News copters circled overhead for a glimpse of the blaze. But by far the best perspective was enjoyed by a drone that appeared in the smoke plume.

The video just appeared on Instagram (thanks phantasma for pointing it out) and it turns out it was flown up there by someone from the Add-a-Ball arcade just down the street from the fire.

Here’s a video showing the fire from the drone’s perspective.

It’s pretty incredible footage, and the type of thing that could make television stations ask why they’re still sending comparatively giant helicopters into the sky. Here’s what the drone looked like from the ground.

On a related topic, on our GeekWire radio show this past week, drone photographer Chad Copeland talked about the potential for drones to be used by fire crews to warn firefighters on the ground when they’re in imminent danger.

The two-alarm fire at the ASKO Seattle metal finishing plant is now under control.

The fire was just down the street from GeekWire’s headquarters. Here’s another picture that I took, showing the intensity of the blaze.

Update: This afternoon I caught up with the owner of the drone, Travis Eckert, co-owner of Add-a-Ball (below), who explained that he had been taking pictures of the fire with his smartphone when he realized he should be flying his drone instead.

It’s a DJI Phantom quadcopter, his second drone. (He lost the first one in Lake Washington.) He was able to see the drone’s view of the ground using the accompanying app on his Android phone, as he controlled the Phantom from the ground.