One huge question to the community. Is anyone aware on how reliable the last known GPS coordinates are? I saw a jump in the flight logs where one second before the crash that the UAV recorded an altitude of over 200 feet. The next coordinate recorded was 20 feet above the ground when it crashed. Question is how accurate is the GPS of a UAV falling out of the sky..

fans5c2b6e7a Posted at 2018-2-15 19:36
Will! I'm still looking. I just wonder why the GPS tracker failed. It was working with 100% battery at take off. I always test that before I take off.

Hard crash probably

Definitely looks like a bird strike or props broke mid-flight. That sucks I feel your pain, I don't think this is a warranty claim however I would like to see the .DAT file that would help clear some things up.

Swedrone Posted at 2018-2-16 08:17
Hard crash probably

The more I think about it the more getting stuck in a tree makes sense. I think it hit the branches hard and the GPS was knocked off and went into the creek below. That would explain the connection loss. According the the last GPS location it should be on a tree above a creek. I'm going to fly around the trees Saturday and see if I can spot it on video. Sunday I'm going out on foot again to see if I can find it. This time I'm bring my 25 year old son. I'm pushing 60 and I am not as mobile as I used to be.

Strobing_NYC_Spark Posted at 2018-2-16 08:24
Definitely looks like a bird strike or props broke mid-flight. That sucks I feel your pain, I don't think this is a warranty claim however I would like to see the .DAT file that would help clear some things up.

Here's the Airdata link if that what you are talking about:
http://app.airdata.com/main?share=uRbBnC

Using Litchi or other third party software on DJI Drone  should not be covered under DJI warranty.

Jason WAI Posted at 2018-2-16 18:12
Using Litchi or other third party software on DJI Drone  should not be covered under DJI warranty.

They should put a warning on the app notifying the users of that every time you take off. Just like the annoying messages of a dirt runway five miles away that keeps appearing.

One thing I don't understand is why you continued to fly, even when you KNEW it was blowing too hard to properly control it.  You said you would abort the waypoint image and go look for deer.  Why?  You should have dropped altitude to decrease the wind, and headed home.  Also remember that the altitude shown in the app is referenced to the HOME point, not the ground under it at any given time.  It can say 200 feet altitude and be sitting on the ground on a hill 200 feet above you.

AG0N-Gary Posted at 2018-2-16 19:01
One thing I don't understand is why you continued to fly, even when you KNEW it was blowing too hard to properly control it.  You said you would abort the waypoint image and go look for deer.  Why?  You should have dropped altitude to decrease the wind, and headed home.  Also remember that the altitude shown in the app is referenced to the HOME point, not the ground under it at any given time.  It can say 200 feet altitude and be sitting on the ground on a hill 200 feet above you.

I was a judgment call. I have over 60 hours of logged flight time since I started keeping track. At 15 minutes a flight that really ads up. I have flow in worse conditions. The wind was not a factor. All evidence is pointing to a hawk attack. My question was why did it crash not what I was doing wrong. I was flying against a 13 MPH wind gust when it went down. That had nothing to do with the UAV spinning out of control and falling from the sky. I'm not trying to be rude. Just pointing out the facts. Thanks for your input. Everyone's opinion matters and helps.

Jason WAI Posted at 2018-2-16 18:12
Using Litchi or other third party software on DJI Drone  should not be covered under DJI warranty.

Time for a class action lawsuit.

fans5c2b6e7a Posted at 2018-2-16 19:35
Time for a class action lawsuit.

Against a raptor?

Like our sharks in Australia, if you venture into their feeding zone dressed like a baby seal then caveat emptor. Sh*t happenz

* hex *   

Mate - your son should find that thing for you hopefully.  I know i can't tell what the ground conditions are like from a satellite image, but it is seriously very close to the house and sheds directly to the East and near that ploughed field.  Being up in a tree would make it a bit harder to find for sure.  Compared to where I live and fly, that is wide open spaces you have there.

I flew in the jungle the other day - that was scary I tell you.

I once spent a week looking for a pair of sunglasses I dropped in a lake - all the locals said "you'll never find them" - well, I did - perseverance.  That drone can be found.  Keep at it.  Then send it in for a repair - might not be too damaged anyway.

I blew up both images for you and put them side by side.  They are showing slightly different positions. That could be because the GPS tracker flew off.  If you can identify the exact position by referencing on the ground to tree branches visible in the image to the east, then it should be found.

Isn't perhaps very helpful,  but last time in the Italian Alps a Friend had a similar issue while I was standing next to him. Suddenly his Mavic pro was spinning around and falling down, really like yours. He was trying to get it stabilized using the RC with countermeasures with nearly no effect. I told him then to use the RTH. And oh wonder, the Mavic stabilized  and returned home normally. I supposed that it could have been a strong upwind, which isn't uncommon,in the mountains; which destabilized the Mavic.

fans5c2b6e7a Posted at 2018-2-15 20:24
I can't find an option to report a crash or a fly away. I talked to someone on the phone and he told me to keep looking for it. I said I would but the area I have to go into is dangerous. The terrine is very inhospitable and I fell twice down a revine the last time i was in there. I slid down a mud hill and landed in a creek. Not to mention it's hunting season so there is a risk that I could be shot by a hunter.

My $60.00 State Farm insurance policy would probably stop me from looking on posted private property.
The video footage, alone, would  have gotten my $900.00 check for my newest adventure drone.

I did witness, first hand a MP that was not visible, hit a tree and crash to the ground on the other side of a lake. It was a fifteen mile drive to get to the last transmitted location. We plugged in the exact lat/longs and walked right to the crash site. Later, all the downloaded info along with the crash scene evidence told the whole story with video to explain it all. Operator malfunction.

My opinion:
If you crash your UAV when you have NO VLOS, suck it up. You take a risk, bottom line. It would have NEVER crashed if you had not launched it. YOU are responsible. If it fell on somebody's head, go ahead, tell them it's not your fault. Good luck with that defense. (the gun in my hand went off but I'm not responsible that somebody died)

I'm truly sorry that any drone crashes and gets lost, I have felt the pain and got over it.
Mr Reality, out...

fans5c2b6e7a Posted at 2018-2-15 22:26
One huge question to the community. Is anyone aware on how reliable the last known GPS coordinates are? I saw a jump in the flight logs where one second before the crash that the UAV recorded an altitude of over 200 feet. The next coordinate recorded was 20 feet above the ground when it crashed. Question is how accurate is the GPS of a UAV falling out of the sky..

Mavic Pro, extremely accurate. Phantom 4 , extremely accurate, Phantom 3, not so much. My experience.

fans5c2b6e7a Posted at 2018-2-16 17:08
Here's the Airdata link if that what you are talking about:
http://app.airdata.com/main?share=uRbBnC

Pretty windy I would say 10 m/s +

I woke up thinking about your drone.  It's got to be high up in that tree judging by the last image it sent.

Looks like prop or gimble motor failure. Pre-flight checks are important and can prevent things like this...

DID YOU DEPLOY THE PARACHUTE?!?!?  ;)

fans5c2b6e7a Posted at 2018-2-16 19:18
I was a judgment call. I have over 60 hours of logged flight time since I started keeping track. At 15 minutes a flight that really ads up. I have flow in worse conditions. The wind was not a factor. All evidence is pointing to a hawk attack. My question was why did it crash not what I was doing wrong. I was flying against a 13 MPH wind gust when it went down. That had nothing to do with the UAV spinning out of control and falling from the sky. I'm not trying to be rude. Just pointing out the facts. Thanks for your input. Everyone's opinion matters and helps.

I have to agree.  I didn't look at your log file, but the video showed definite spinning (fairly flat).  To me, that looks like a hit.  A prop would immediately put it upside down and continue unpredictably out of control after that.  On the other hand, a hawk hit may snap a prop, but would likely send it spinning before the effect of a broken prop kicks in.

I still would have dropped altitude and landed as soon as possible after finding the wind was so bad it made control questionable...but that's just me.  In fact, if it got into a situation where the wind wouldn't let you bring it home at all, I'd just look for a soft and clear place to put it down so you can go get it.  Thirteen MPH isn't enough to take control away.  It's kinda rare to find the wind lower than that around here a lot of times.

AG0N-Gary Posted at 2018-2-17 13:52
I have to agree.  I didn't look at your log file, but the video showed definite spinning (fairly flat).  To me, that looks like a hit.  A prop would immediately put it upside down and continue unpredictably out of control after that.  On the other hand, a hawk hit may snap a prop, but would likely send it spinning before the effect of a broken prop kicks in.

I still would have dropped altitude and landed as soon as possible after finding the wind was so bad it made control questionable...but that's just me.  In fact, if it got into a situation where the wind wouldn't let you bring it home at all, I'd just look for a soft and clear place to put it down so you can go get it.  Thirteen MPH isn't enough to take control away.  It's kinda rare to find the wind lower than that around here a lot of times.

Just to clear up the use of Litchi, DJI WILL cover a no user fault accident as long as it wasn't the actual app (Litchi) that caused the crash & from the look  of the video, it wasn't litchis fault your bird went down, more likely a bird strike  or a very tall tree grabbed your bird!
Look up, way up, i used the find my drone feature to find my bird, could not find her in a 100' circle from center of area shown as crash site, then i looked up & there she was 80' up stuck right on crown of a fir tree. Had to hire guys from a climbing wall co. to get her down.
I was using Litchi waypoint mission & logs showed a motor went out, DJI said they would fix, no issues, but, sent me a brand new Mavic Pro, all happened in less than a month, good to see DJI's help has improved very much in past year
Good luck finding your bird.

fans5c2b6e7a Posted at 2018-2-15 20:24
I can't find an option to report a crash or a fly away. I talked to someone on the phone and he told me to keep looking for it. I said I would but the area I have to go into is dangerous. The terrine is very inhospitable and I fell twice down a revine the last time i was in there. I slid down a mud hill and landed in a creek. Not to mention it's hunting season so there is a risk that I could be shot by a hunter.

Sorry for the situation. Did you get the result of data analysis now? I would recommend you wait for it and if you have doubt about it, please inform us. Thanks for your support.

I lost my mavic pro very recently. I have been flying many times with 20% battery before and have no issue. This time, it forced land by itself. I pressed stop many times and it failed to cancel landing. At the end, I have to find a bush and crash land. I cannot retrieve my aircraft too. Completely panic and depressed experience. Contact DJI and they insisted it was misoperation. But how could the user cannot full control of the aircraft even the battery low. It was 20% and I have plenty of time to come home. If it forces land on highway I would have caused catastrophic disaster by causing accident or kill someone. Please anyone, reconsider if you want to buy DJI products again. I have two other friends, playing quickshot mode and fail to stop too. Again DJI push the responsibility to user. Everything is user fault. Scam company!

When landing didn't you have the Throttle up?

Good news is that I finally found it. I do want to thank everyone here for the suggestions and support. I have a perfect picture of what happened now. I did turn off message notifications because for some reason the DJI email alerts would freeze my Outlook 2007 email client. Anyway, my drone fell from the sky on 12 February, 2018. I searched repeatably in some bad terrain. After the crash we had a Nor' Easter storm for three weeks in a row. For two months the drone was buried under three feet of snow. I found it on 23/4, yesterday. I am working on a comprehensive video to explain what happened with the crash and what I had to do to find the lost drone. It wasn't easy. It crashed into a tick infested nasty wet swamp like area that was externally protected by pricker bushes. If I was on "Naked And Afraid" I would have tapped out in two minutes.

Here is a briefing of what happened. It was hovering over a hay field at 200 feet. Suddenly there was a jolt on the video and it started spinning out of control. It took six seconds to hit the ground from 200 feet.
I recovered the video and know why it crashed. A lot of guys in this thread thought it was a bird strike. The crash video disproves that. It's obvious a prop just broke and it fell from the sky. The last known GPS position put it over a creek. I put waders on and walked through that creek. The current was extremely strong and I remember thinking if it crashed here, it got washed downstream and I will never find it. With nothing to loose I started walking a circular grid. The waders turned out to be important because I had to cross the creek several times. At the same time I am looking at the GPS coordinates on my phone. I walked up to a part of the grid that I hadn't checked yet and saw something not natural. I walked up on it and it was my drone buried face down into a dirt and a pile of leaves. Yeah I finally found it. Badly broken but in my hands. The following are some quick YouTube links showing the out come.

My best advise is if you crash... If you are near water all bets are off.
Otherwise your drone will be in a 25 foot radius from your last known position. When they crash they normally nose dive and drill nose down into the dirt. Search a 25 foot radius and don't give up. It's there. It just takes some work to find it.

- Description

Crash Video -

Take care y'all!

fans5c2b6e7a Posted at 2018-2-15 22:26
One huge question to the community. Is anyone aware on how reliable the last known GPS coordinates are? I saw a jump in the flight logs where one second before the crash that the UAV recorded an altitude of over 200 feet. The next coordinate recorded was 20 feet above the ground when it crashed. Question is how accurate is the GPS of a UAV falling out of the sky..

I can speak from total first hand experience. My drone fell out of the sky and I did eventually find it in some nasty terrain. I would say give your self a 25 foot radius from the last known coordinates.

integer Posted at 2018-2-28 04:24
When landing didn't you have the Throttle up?

I had no control. It just fell out of the sky. Nothing I could do.

DJI Elektra Posted at 2018-2-28 00:09
Sorry for the situation. Did you get the result of data analysis now? I would recommend you wait for it and if you have doubt about it, please inform us. Thanks for your support.

I found it.

fans987d278a Posted at 2018-2-20 11:28
Just to clear up the use of Litchi, DJI WILL cover a no user fault accident as long as it wasn't the actual app (Litchi) that caused the crash & from the look  of the video, it wasn't litchis fault your bird went down, more likely a bird strike  or a very tall tree grabbed your bird!
Look up, way up, i used the find my drone feature to find my bird, could not find her in a 100' circle from center of area shown as crash site, then i looked up & there she was 80' up stuck right on crown of a fir tree. Had to hire guys from a climbing wall co. to get her down.
I was using Litchi waypoint mission & logs showed a motor went out, DJI said they would fix, no issues, but, sent me a brand new Mavic Pro, all happened in less than a month, good to see DJI's help has improved very much in past year

Good thing it wasn't my fault.

Tex21 Posted at 2018-2-17 12:37
I woke up thinking about your drone.  It's got to be high up in that tree judging by the last image it sent.

Oh nice!!! No bro.. I found it on the ground. Mashed into the dirt.

Bob Brown Posted at 2018-2-17 13:12
Looks like prop or gimble motor failure. Pre-flight checks are important and can prevent things like this...

DID YOU DEPLOY THE PARACHUTE?!?!?  ;)

Yeah and it landed on your mom.

fans5c2b6e7a Posted at 2018-2-13 21:33
Yes I did. I went to that exact spot. No luck. I was literately standing where it was marked. The GPS gives you a general idea as to where it is. I figure it's in a 40 foot radius. UI also had a GPS tracker attached to the drone. But it failed when it crashed. No help there.

go at least 100 ft radius, that's where I found mine.

at the price I paid for my Mavic Pro I would never give up until I found it! Unless of course it landed in a deep lake.

fans5c2b6e7a Posted at 2018-4-23 23:07
Yeah and it landed on your mom.

Such nastiness!

I had an issue where I still do not know exactly what happened but mine just fell from the sky BUT luckily was not too high up and fell softly in a bush causing no damage other than two broken props.  It could of or not been a bird that hit mine, or a prop broke I still am not sure but either way found it as it was not too far and all was good.  BUT I did open a case anyway and DJI says they will not cover it due to a prop broken.  Here is what they replied back to me.

"As of this writing, we are truly sorry because the propellers does not enjoy a warranty."
Now maybe I read that wrong and they mean they just won't replace broken props?  To me it sounds like they do not cover it due to a prop failure but I coud be wrong.

There's a Brit here enjoying your success! For what it's worth, I stopped midway down this thread and got the maps out. I had your area of search about 200 yards north of the E Shodack Road. I would have kept going back till I found it, so I'm so glad you did. The damage? That'll buff out!

SparksBird Posted at 2018-4-24 09:40
I had an issue where I still do not know exactly what happened but mine just fell from the sky BUT luckily was not too high up and fell softly in a bush causing no damage other than two broken props.  It could of or not been a bird that hit mine, or a prop broke I still am not sure but either way found it as it was not too far and all was good.  BUT I did open a case anyway and DJI says they will not cover it due to a prop broken.  Here is what they replied back to me.

"As of this writing, we are truly sorry because the propellers does not enjoy a warranty."

That's lame!!! Especially if they are original equipment. Like buying a car that crashes but they won't pay because the brakes aren't covered under warranty.

Dorset_Horn Posted at 2018-4-24 10:28
There's a Brit here enjoying your success! For what it's worth, I stopped midway down this thread and got the maps out. I had your area of search about 200 yards north of the E Shodack Road. I would have kept going back till I found it, so I'm so glad you did. The damage? That'll buff out!

Hey My Britt friend! My mom and dad were from England and I do appreciate your interest and support. It worked out well. It was a long cold winter. When I could finally get back out there to search it was only about 15 feet North of the last recorded GPS position. 42.554951 -73.668408

It's not the first time I had a drone go down but in all cases the drones were found within a 20 foot radius of the last recorded location. You have to trust the GPS.

Picanoc Jack Posted at 2018-4-24 05:40
at the price I paid for my Mavic Pro I would never give up until I found it! Unless of course it landed in a deep lake.

There is a video on YouTube of a guy who flew his Mavic Pro into a waterfall then tried to find it with a RC Submarine. Last time I checked he is still looking for it.

fans5c2b6e7a Posted at 2018-4-23 22:55
Good thing it wasn't my fault.

Yeah I thought about how I would get it down if it was stuck in a tree. The average tree height in the area is about 60 feet. My plan was to buy 8' sections of PVC pipe and attach the couplers with duct tape. I figured I would need about six pipes. Then just push it out of a tree and bring the pipe back. That was the plan but was never executed.

It looks like drone landed on its side and is up in air.  Possibly in top of tree.

Okay it was found.