This is the breathtaking footage of a drone becoming caught up inside a sudden murmuration of thousands of starlings as the birds circle before roosting for the night in nearby trees in Conwy Principal Area, the United Kingdom on February 11.

Remarkably, the expert formation flyers had no difficulty avoiding the drone despite their speed and collective acrobatics.

"It was a lovely still evening and we'd had the drone in the air for about 10 minutes and had been taking a multi-shot panorama of the sun setting behind the hills," said Sam Warrenger, founder of DronePics.Wales who was flying the drone at the time.

"While attempting to return to our take-off point, I suddenly noticed huge murmuration of starlings had begun to circle in the area between us and the drone. There was no sign of them when we first sent the drone up, but the starlings were now quickly growing in numbers with new flocks of hundreds of birds arriving and joining the formation every minute.

"At first, I thought the safest thing to do would be to slowly reduce the drone's altitude and bring it back towards base, but as the number of birds continued to grow they not only circled the drone but engulfed it within the middle of the fast moving murmuration. It became clear any movement only increased the risk of a collision.

"It was certainly a nerve-racking moment. There were no suitable sites for a controlled landing underneath the birds without losing line-of-sight and in any case, the swooping mass of thousands of birds was passing both above and below the drone. I considered performing an emergency stop in the few seconds between passes, cutting power to drone's rotors and sending it into a sudden freefall, but being over a busy residential area at rush hour I decided the risk of injury to anyone passing below was simply too great.

"I decided the safest course of action was to keep the drone perfectly still in the hope the birds would learn it's position and avoid it, and fortunately, this proved to be the correct decision. As we always bring the drone back with enough battery power to delay landing in unexpected circumstances, it was able to hover in one spot until the birds began to thin out, as they gradually moved away from the residential area and dropped into the trees along the beach to roost for the night.

"With the murmuration reducing in numbers and now circling slightly further away, I had enough time between passes to make some progress back to base and was able to land the drone without incident. While I've encountered pigeons circling our drones or curious seagulls in the past, I'd never seen anything like this during a flight.

"I now know that while they're typically associated with autumn, starling murmurations also frequently occur in the spring and generally at the same location each night should the weather permit. There are websites which map the locations of common murmurations and as they can appear so suddenly, I'll now be checking those maps as part of every pre-flight risk assessment when flying the drones in the early evening. While this particular murmuration over Colwyn Bay doesn't currently feature on these maps, I've provided the information to the Starlings in the UK website so it can be added and will be advising other drone pilots why it's worth checking these roost maps before any sunset flights, particularly in the spring and autumn."

Breathtaking footage of a drone becoming caught up inside a sudden murmuration of thousands of starlings as the birds circle before roosting for the night in nearby trees.

Remarkably, the expert formation flyers had no difficulty avoiding the drone despite their speed and collective acrobatics.

Quotes by myself, Sam Warrenger, founder of DronePics.Wales who was flying the drone at the time: "It was a lovely still evening and we'd had the drone in the air for about 10 minutes and had been taking a multi-shot panorama of the sun setting behind the hills.

"While attempting to return to our take-off point, I suddenly noticed huge murmuration of starlings had begun to circle in the area between us and the drone. There was no sign of them when we first sent the drone up, but the starlings were now quickly growing in numbers with new flocks of hundreds of birds arriving and joining the formation every minute.

"At first, I thought the safest thing to do would be to slowly reduce the drone's altitude and bring it back towards base, but as the number of birds continued to grow they not only circled the drone but engulfed it within the middle of the fast moving murmuration. It became clear any movement only increased the risk of a collision.

"It was certainly a nerve-racking moment. There were no suitable sites for a controlled landing underneath the birds without losing line-of-sight and in any case, the swooping mass of thousands of birds was passing both above and below the drone. I considered performing an emergency stop in the few seconds between passes, cutting power to drone's rotors and sending it into a sudden freefall, but being over a busy residential area at rush hour I decided the risk of injury to anyone passing below was simply too great.

"I decided the safest course of action was to keep the drone perfectly still in the hope the birds would learn it's position and avoid it, and fortunately, this proved to be the correct decision. As we always bring the drone back with enough battery power to delay landing in unexpected circumstances, it was able to hover in one spot until the birds began to thin out, as they gradually moved away from the residential area and dropped into the trees along the beach to roost for the night.

"With the murmuration reducing in numbers and now circling slightly further away, I had enough time between passes to make some progress back to base and was able to land the drone without incident. While I've encountered pigeons circling our drones or curious seagulls in the past, I'd never seen anything like this during a flight.

"I now know that while they're typically associated with autumn, starling murmurations also frequently occur in the spring and generally at the same location each night should the weather permit. There are websites which map the locations of common murmurations and as they can appear so suddenly, I'll now be checking those maps as part of every pre-flight risk assessment when flying the drones in the early evening. While this particular murmuration over Colwyn Bay doesn't currently feature on these maps, I've provided the information to the Starlings in the UK website so it can be added and will be advising other drone pilots why it's worth checking these roost maps before any sunset flights, particularly in the spring and autumn."