Geoffrey Robson
New member
OK, here's a pretty remarkable story that's a testament to the robustness of the HMC151, and to the honesty of a stranger.
Last month I was on holiday in my native South Africa. Of course I took my 2 month old HMC151 with me to document my adventures. After a journey of perhaps 10 miles over a tortuous mountain pass, riding pillion on a friend's motorcycle at speeds of up to 140 mph, I discovered that the zip on the backpack I was using to carry the HMC151 had worked itself open. There was no sign of the camera...
I presumed it had been destroyed, but wanted to find it, if only to recover the memory card and give the camera a proper burial. Night was falling, so we jumped into a car and retraced our journey, but found nothing. I reasoned that it might have fallen out on a short stretch of motorway, since that's when we attained our highest speed. I parked the car, and within seconds of searching with a flashlight, I found the rubber cushion for the eye viewfinder! But despite extensive searching, we couldn't find the camera.
The next day we placed a large "LOST VIDEO CAMERA" sign on one of the signposts on the slipway leading onto the motorway, along with some contact telephone numbers.
A week later I returned to the UK. The day after I arrived, my dad called me to tell me that someone had my camera and wanted to return it! A good Samaritan had found it in the middle of the motorway that night, and was holding on to it, wondering how he could find the owner. He even refused the reward I offered.
Friends of my dad's were travelling back to the UK a week later, so they brought it with them. I've now had a bit of time to examine it, and to my astonishment and delight, it appears to be working. To be sure, the aluminium chassis has been ground away quite a bit on some corners, but functionally it seems fine. The lens hood stayed on, so there isn't even the slightest scratch on the lens. Ironically, it's the memory card that's broken. I'll be contacting data recovery companies about recovering the footage.
It might be that over time I'll discover something that doesn't work quite as it should, but I'm confident that it's still perfectly usable, at least for now. I was clearly very, very lucky. If it had fallen out during one of the many bends on the mountain pass, it would very likely have been completely destroyed, and never even found (or at least never returned to me).
I guess the lesson of the story is to ensure you always have the zip sliders at the bottom of the backpack when you close it. Drawing each of them up to the top, and then travelling at high speed on a motorcycle, is asking for trouble. Or of course you could just travel by car...
Last month I was on holiday in my native South Africa. Of course I took my 2 month old HMC151 with me to document my adventures. After a journey of perhaps 10 miles over a tortuous mountain pass, riding pillion on a friend's motorcycle at speeds of up to 140 mph, I discovered that the zip on the backpack I was using to carry the HMC151 had worked itself open. There was no sign of the camera...
I presumed it had been destroyed, but wanted to find it, if only to recover the memory card and give the camera a proper burial. Night was falling, so we jumped into a car and retraced our journey, but found nothing. I reasoned that it might have fallen out on a short stretch of motorway, since that's when we attained our highest speed. I parked the car, and within seconds of searching with a flashlight, I found the rubber cushion for the eye viewfinder! But despite extensive searching, we couldn't find the camera.
The next day we placed a large "LOST VIDEO CAMERA" sign on one of the signposts on the slipway leading onto the motorway, along with some contact telephone numbers.
A week later I returned to the UK. The day after I arrived, my dad called me to tell me that someone had my camera and wanted to return it! A good Samaritan had found it in the middle of the motorway that night, and was holding on to it, wondering how he could find the owner. He even refused the reward I offered.
Friends of my dad's were travelling back to the UK a week later, so they brought it with them. I've now had a bit of time to examine it, and to my astonishment and delight, it appears to be working. To be sure, the aluminium chassis has been ground away quite a bit on some corners, but functionally it seems fine. The lens hood stayed on, so there isn't even the slightest scratch on the lens. Ironically, it's the memory card that's broken. I'll be contacting data recovery companies about recovering the footage.
It might be that over time I'll discover something that doesn't work quite as it should, but I'm confident that it's still perfectly usable, at least for now. I was clearly very, very lucky. If it had fallen out during one of the many bends on the mountain pass, it would very likely have been completely destroyed, and never even found (or at least never returned to me).
I guess the lesson of the story is to ensure you always have the zip sliders at the bottom of the backpack when you close it. Drawing each of them up to the top, and then travelling at high speed on a motorcycle, is asking for trouble. Or of course you could just travel by car...
