I was thinking the same thing. Even in Dubai they barely use them and now you’re telling me it’s a common commodity for illegal miners in Peru. Ya right.
The miners are not Peruvian nationals. It takes a lot of capital to sneak into the Peruvian jungle and start mining.
I'm a bit dubious about the jetpacks but the rest - that miners are trying to scare Indigenous locals - is legit, and it's far from the first time this has happened.
Hope they crash and get nursed back to health by the indigenous people, undergo a spiritual awakening, and lead a violent uprising against the mining company.
We could call it Fern Gully: Origins and make it a realistic CGI with expressionless talking animals (and whoever is doing the work of Robin Williams and Tim Curry these days but worse).
I feel like underground mines are more and more a thing of thr past, I have seen many an operating surface mine but only old mines that were converted to attractions.
For the jetpack doubters (I was one too), someone posted this link on slashdot. Scroll down a bit and you’ll see a picture of a girl who snapped a picture on her phone of what is very clearly a guy in a jetpack of some kind. The theory is the miners use them to scout new locations to see if enough minerals are present to clear a road to them.