Authorities at Yellowstone National Park are investigating reports that a tourist crashed a drone into the Grand Prismatic Spring , the park 's largest hot spring , on Saturday . The tourist approached a park employee about getting the drone back after losing it in the almost 200-feet deep hot spring . The employee let the tourist go without initially reporting the incident to authorities . `` I do n't think the person who they spoke with realized that drones could n't be flown in the park or the implications of what they were being told , '' Amy Bartlett , spokesperson for Yellowstone National Park , told CNN . Drones are banned in national parks . The National Park Service announced in June that it was prohibiting unmanned aircraft from all park service-controlled lands and waters , totaling about 84 million acres throughout the country . Park rangers have not yet spoken to the drone 's operator and are still trying to determine if they can even track that person down . `` The technology certainly has been around for a while , but this is the year that the problem has seemed to come to light for us , '' Bartlett said . Park rangers have not determined if the drone damaged the spring and if it 's necessary to recover it . This is the latest in a string of recent drone incidents in national parks and beyond . Visitors watching the sunset over the Grand Canyon were interrupted by a loud drone in April . And volunteers reported that a herd of bighorn sheep at Zion National Park in Utah scattered after being harassed by a drone . Also , a Seattle woman called police in June to report a peeping Tom drone . The drone was hovering outside of her high-rise window , and the woman saw operators on the ground below with camera equipment . The drone operators insist that they were not spying on the woman , but rather her view . They were working on plans for a new building . Police said as long as the drone was flying in a public space , there was little that they could do .
Tourist said to have crashed drone into Park . National Park Service officials not sure if drone damaged June or if it needs to be recovered . Grand Prismatic Spring banned drones in its parks in the spring .