VIDEO: Radio-controlled aircraft provides wild ride over Red River flood, downtown Grand Forks-EGF

• View of the Red, Sorlie Bridge and East Grand Forks

This is a still photo taken from an aerial view provided by a small camera attached to a remote-controlled training aircraft, flown Friday from the top level of the Grand Forks County Office building parking ramp. The image shows the rising Red River, traffic on the Sorlie Bridge - a day before it was closed - and part of downtown East Grand Forks.
• Sorlie Bridge over flooded Red River last week

This image, taken last week from an aerial video posted to YouTube on Friday, April 8, 2011, of downtown Grand Forks and East Grand Forks and the flooded Red River, shows the Sorlie Bridge a day before it was closed to traffic and sealed off at both ends by temporary floodwalls. The video was recorded from a portable remote-control flight training aircraft.

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You've likely never viewed a Red River flood in this manner.

A YouTube video posted Friday provides unique aerial views -- sometimes dizzying, at times fascinating -- recorded that day over the flooded Red River and downtown areas of Grand Forks and East Grand Forks.

The source? A portable remote-controlled flight-training aircraft.

According to video comments posted by "bassman98743," the apparent pilot, the video images were acquired using a $40 mini-video camera attached to the remote-controlled club trainer, referred to as "Apprentice."

The foam-constructed E-flite Apprentice is sold as a ready-to-fly plane using a radio transmitter, receiver and battery.

The images recorded from this Apprentice include not only the flooded Red and traffic on the Sorlie Bridge - it was closed Saturday and sealed on both ends by temporary flood walls - but also some images of downtown rooftops and street scenes, particularly in the latter half of the video. The overhead views sometimes are much closer to buildings than others.

For a video viewer, it's frequently a wild ride - though not quite what the pilot desired.

"Wish I would have climbed higher, lots of water only views," "bassman98743" writes in the YouTube comments. "The best shot of the flood is at 5:18..."

The video begins by shows the training aircraft being launched from the top deck of the Grand Forks County Building's parking ramp:

A second YouTube video also was uploaded Friday by "bassman 98743." Rather than show flood views, it offers aerial images of west Grand Forks. For this flight, the Apprentice was launched from the UND rugby field west of Interstate 29, according to the video description.

Tags: 2011 floods, red river, gf and egf, flood videos, updates, aviation, flood, videos, fccnetwork