Stephen Powelson recently flew his Phantom 3 drone over Tesla's battery factory in Fremont, California and recorded the flight. Almost as soon as he posted the video to a Tesla Motors Club forum, other commenters began warning Powelson of the legal trouble he might be in.
Powelson quickly assured concerned posters that Tesla employees had no problem with the video. In fact, he'd worked at the company for almost five years, until March of this year.
The video gives the viewer a sense of how big the factory is. At 5.3 million sq. feet, the Fremont facility is dwarfed by the proposed gigafactory that Tesla is building in Nevada, which is estimated to be about 10 million sq. feet when completed — one of the biggest in the world.
Though the video is neat — and high-quality for drone footage — a viewer might notice something missing: solar panels. Musk's SolarCity makes them; he might consider making himself one of his customers. Still, there is a nice Easter egg for Tesla fans: a glimpse of what could be three Model X SUVs on the left at the 1:44 mark.
