This week is my first time publicly asking for donations in 4 years. There are far more important things people can donate to, so although I do feel like this is important to me, I don’t want anyone to feel any kind of pressure to donate.
Last December I applied for a grant to get a new much-needed drone, but I didn’t get approved and to this day I’m nowhere close to being able to afford a drone that I want. My new job doesn’t pay well enough and I felt like I had no choice but to ask my supporters and fans for help or else I may have to keep waiting a long time before I can finally afford this.
Last month a very kind supporter of my work sent me a donation to replace my dead drone remote controller, so now I have a working remote controller and my drone is functional again, but it still has issues and should not be the primary drone I rely on for every shoot I do. I’ve had the same drone model since 2018 and I really need an upgrade. It has been giving me lots of issues for over the past year with connectivity, obstacle avoidance, calibration, and general reliability. One time I even lost connection while my drone was hovering over a slaughterhouse that I was very close to and I thought my heart was going to jump out of my body, but luckily the drone came back and landed by me.
Not only would a new drone be immensely helpful as a tool for my documentation gear, but it’ll also be a pivotal asset to help me earn income outside of animal rights that can go towards my activism efforts since my documentation and advocacy work doesn’t earn me much income at all. As a licensed drone pilot I can get paid gigs that will help me to live and help me to continue and broaden my activism efforts.
All donations are greatly appreciated and no donation is too small. You can go to the GoFundMe fundraiser here. At the moment my fundraiser is a touch over 25% towards the goal since I launched it Sunday evening.
Below I’ll share some photos I’ve captured with my drone over the years.
Thank you for your consideration.