I had planned a flight for a location 1.1 miles from an uncontrolled airport - Class G airspace. I'm a 107 pilot. Before I left I logged on to the DJI site and unlocked the zone for the flight. I've flown in this area before; after unlocking the zone. When I arrived at the location and powered up the aircraft (P4) I got the message "Cannot Take Off", and the overall status said "Cannot take off in a no-fly zone". I went to the DJI Go 4 My Unlock NFZ Application section and the airport in question showed a valid. I went thru the unlock process again on the iPad I use for flight. I still received the message cannot take off. I packed up and drove to a location just outside the NFZ and was able to fly (1.8 miles from the airport). After a short flight there I returned to the original planed location and was able to fly.


Does anyone have an explanation for this? Must the Phantom be powered up outside the NFZ after the unlock but before entering the NFZ?

We do not recommend to fly in no fly zone. Technically, if the drone had taken off in NFZ by accident, that might because the drone had not detected it was in NFZ, once it had detected, the drone would be forced to land. If you need to fly in NFZ, I suggest that you can apply for the unlock, you can contact our unlock team by email flysafe@dji.com.
Thank you for your understanding.

DJI Thor Posted at 2017-7-24 19:43
We do not recommend to fly in no fly zone. Technically, if the drone had taken off in NFZ by accident, that might because the drone had not detected it was in NFZ, once it had detected, the drone would be forced to land. If you need to fly in NFZ, I suggest that you can apply for the unlock, you can contact our unlock team by email .
Thank you for your understanding.

Technically it is not a FAA No-Fly Zone.  “No-Fly Zone” is just the terminology DJI uses in the DJI Go 4 app to describe this area and unlock it.  As I said, this airspace is class G, but within 1.5 miles of a untowered airport; which appears to be the Authorization Zone radius for this airport.

I’m curious why I was not able to fly in the zone I unlocked, but later was.  How do I know I will be reliably able to fly in a zone I have properly unlocked?

I'm going to guess that if you had rebooted the AC, it would have worked.  

Hello,

I am a professional French pilot.
I have all the necessary authorizations to practice my profession.
Overnight, DJI decides to remove the flight authorizations without distinguishing between professionals and amateurs.
Dji could ask the account of each user, the documents proving that we are in conformity with the rules of our countries, and this, definitively.
We have the right to fly in all no-fly zones after obtaining the agreement of our administrations.
Dji places himself above the sovereignty of each country by proceeding in this way.
As a client, I find this inadmissible.

This "NFZ" issue needs to be revisited by DJI. As I am experiencing it the new updates are restricting me from flying anywhere within the 5 mile radius of a class D airspace which according to the first and now revised FAA rules is perfectly legal with the authorization of the airport operator and the ATC tower. I really appreciate that we have a community that is working so hard to focus on safety and responsibility. I do find it incredibly frustrated that DJI has made some arbitrary restrictions that don't match up with FAA regulations. I am also seeing a lot of comments by people confusing DJI's term "NFZ" with an actual no fly zone. I am not questioning the authority or purpose of NFZ's, but by DJI restricting flight in airspace that has restrictions but not an outright ban on UAV flight. If they rezoned my area as a FAA defined NFZ I wouldn't question the issue. I am only questioning restriction of legal flight. Can anyone help me understand why I can't unlock flight in class D airspace where I have flown for the last year with proper authorization from both the airport and ATC?

Thanks in advance for the answers