I lost my mini 3 pro drone a half mile up a mountain in Death Valley yesterday. Because these drones overheat when they’re not flying, there was plenty of battery left but it shut down about one minute after crashing because of overheating. This means I cannot connect to it for normal recovery tools, but I did use the “find my drone” map, which is supposed to show the last known location of the drone (red arrow) and my current location (blue dot) based on the RC remote. However, after a group of us hiked up the mountain and followed the directions from the blue dot to the red arrow, meaning the drone itself, it let us on a wild goose chase for 2 exhausting hours before we finally gave up. The blue arrow kept changing directions sending us in different directions, and the line between the blue dot and the red arrow would grow and shrink with no clear reason. It would seem this feature didn’t work in my case.  I don't understand how the "flash and beep" feature is supposed to work when the mini 3 pro shuts down so quickly after crashing.  I saw on the remote that it landed in a bush so it was alive but told me it turned itself off to stop from overheating.  Death Valley has claimed another victim.  

Also, my RC remote didn't have the footage from the flight it crashed on.  I would have figured the video file would be recording while the drone was in flight so even if it crashed, I would have the file.  My remote has successfully recorded every other flight I've done.


Any help would be much appreciated.  For next time.  It's a very long and treacherous drive to the mountain where it went down.

I have a DJI Care Express policy but my understanding is I need to ship DJI a broken drone to be able to use it.

Hello, there. Sorry for the inconvenience. We saw that you are unable to find your drone now, we recommend you claim a flyaway case first.
Here is the link:
https://repair.dji.com/us/repair/flyaway
About the Find My Drone function:
The last coordinate system position when the aircraft was lost. (This location records the coordinate system position of the aircraft in the last connection communication.)
The last coordinate system of the flyaway aircraft. (It records the coordinate system information of the aircraft in the last communication.)
1: If the aircraft still has power and the communication is normal, tap Start. The light will flash, and the aircraft will beep.
2: If the aircraft still has power and the communication is normal, tap and view the image information of the aircraft’s current position to help determine the aircraft position.
When the DJI Mini 3 Pro is used with the DJI RC N1 Remote Controller, the video for the 10s prior to the signal lost will be saved in the app; when it is used with the DJI RC Remote Controller, such video is not available.