Most advices here at near flyaway topics end with: 'You should switch to ATTI mode, but you need to practice it a lot".
Somebody new in drone flying might get the impression that it is very tricky skill.
But the only difference is, that the drone can't maintain the position if you put hands off the sticks. It drifts with the wind, so you need to fly in opposite direction if the drone is drifting away from the operator. But do that in the place with no obstacles near.
In the real situation if the navigation map is working it is easy. Just try to switch to ATTI when the drone is only few m away from you and you can see, how to fly. You just need some wind of course.  
If you can't see the drone and if the map is frozen, than no skill can help you to bring the drone back to HP.

Andy   

Well, I agree with much you say, however if you have the "radar" working on the display, even if out of visual range, you can bring the drone back.  It does require some practice, but is not too difficult.

Your points are thoughtful and make sense.
The underlying issues are a bit more involved with all of this.  Yes basic flying in ATTI mode is not magic, but some practice is very useful.  However, the real issues and problems is UAV operators applying all their flying skills and knowledge at once in a timely manner when things are not working correctly or going wrong.  Hate to say it, but it is a real factor, some operators panic when things are going wrong.  This results in misapplication of controls, no control input, or switching or canceling some actions/modes.  All of which then directly contributes to the loss of the aircraft, crash, or fly away; sometimes operators luck out but we usually don't hear about those, just the ones that don't.
All of this means that a good UAV operator must review their manual and know their bird and the full system capabilities and then practice using them all with the idea of a situation going wrong.  They need to "what if" situations to puzzle through in advance about how to work out possible solutions based on those capabilities.  Then again, they need to practice those scenarios either in part or whole i.e. fly in ATTI mode or use RTH under varying conditions to see how the bird reacts so you know in advance what to expect.
These efforts will not solve every problem or ones where something goes very wrong very fast but it helps to reduce the panic factor and prep operators for when things do go south, and hopefully results in more positive outcomes.  

You will need to be more aggressive with stick movements as you will be fighting the wind , best place to practice is open field try it at alt 50 feet where there are no obstacles getting it lower until you feel confident enough to land.
If you lose gps no need to switch to Atti mode it’s probably the worse thing you can do, Atti will kick in automatically without switching and as soon as you regain gps you will still be in P mode, if you use the switch you will never know if you recovered gps.
Good luck.

"drone can't maintain the position if you put hands off the sticks."

Totally agree with Genghis, hallmark and Kneepuck. It's not easy but with some practice you'll improve and become better equipped to deal with those 'what if' scenarios.

Grant it, if the copter is out-of-sight, non working radar screen and RTH is out of order, man this spells trouble.

Honestly, I learned a ton flying those cheap (uncontrollable) SYMA copters. I spent countless hours trying to perfect my piloting skills and so glad I did because I'm definitely skilled with the DJI copter. Practice will develop improvement but not perfection.

If I was in the same situation I'd described above, I'd be up a crap creek too.

M.C. Pilot Posted at 2017-10-19 10:28
"drone can't maintain the position if you put hands off the sticks."

Totally agree with Genghis, hallmark and Kneepuck. It's not easy but with some practice you'll improve and become better equipped to deal with those 'what if' scenarios.

"Grant it, if the copter is out-of-sight, non working radar screen and RTH is out of order, man this spells trouble."

No trouble at all!  Just look at the live video feed and fly it back FPV

Note that if there is no GPS then you can not trust the map or radar direction indication to be accurate, better to navigate FPV, and if you are not sure you can do that then just land it where it is while its location on the map is still reasonably accurate so that you can go and pick it up.

I suspect the advice to switch to ATTI mode is referring to the problems that some have had with a badly calibrated compass, causing conflict with the GPS data and causing the aircraft to take on the 'toilet bowl effect' when flying. The work around is to switch manually to ATTI. So if all is working properly there shouldn't really be any need for choosing to switch to ATTI mode. Which is probably why the manually switched ATTI mode has been removed in the Mavic.

Genghis9 Posted at 2017-10-19 09:28
Your points are thoughtful and make sense.
The underlying issues are a bit more involved with all of this.  Yes basic flying in ATTI mode is not magic, but some practice is very useful.  However, the real issues and problems is UAV operators applying all their flying skills and knowledge at once in a timely manner when things are not working correctly or going wrong.  Hate to say it, but it is a real factor, some operators panic when things are going wrong.  This results in misapplication of controls, no control input, or switching or canceling some actions/modes.  All of which then directly contributes to the loss of the aircraft, crash, or fly away; sometimes operators luck out but we usually don't hear about those, just the ones that don't.
All of this means that a good UAV operator must review their manual and know their bird and the full system capabilities and then practice using them all with the idea of a situation going wrong.  They need to "what if" situations to puzzle through in advance about how to work out possible solutions based on those capabilities.  Then again, they need to practice those scenarios either in part or whole i.e. fly in ATTI mode or use RTH under varying conditions to see how the bird reacts so you know in advance what to expect.

I agree, skills, experience and practice are invaluable, but nothing will work if you panic.

Dockater Posted at 2017-10-19 14:19
I agree, skills, experience and practice are invaluable, but nothing will work if you panic.

Agree, assuming you don't experience some kind of catastrophic failure i.e. a prop falling off, then you need two extremely important elements to maintaining aircraft control and dealing with a problem.
1-Good Situational Awareness (SA), the better your SA the better you will do
2-Experience, coupled with knowledge, the more you are practiced the more your responses are quick and timely (muscle memory is key here too)
Loss of SA alone can lead to a crash or damage.  Lack of experience can lead to taking the wrong actions or being too slow in doing so.  When you have little to no SA and being inexperienced this becomes a recipe for disaster when something goes wrong and certainly ups the chances for one to panic as they have no basis from which to act or begin resolving/handling the problem.
A good drone operator will not only practice good camera & UAV control but also responses to urgent situations and equipment procedures & controls.  
Panic as a response, never solved anything, better to go down fighting than screaming your lungs out and crying about it or just standing there frozen with fear or disappointment.  However, making the right decisions and taking the correct actions in trying to stop & fix the problem wont happen by accident.  In other words, don't just stand there, do something is not a good course of action!

I was highly motivated to learn how to fly the drone home simply because of the terrain here.  When I fly across the canyon, which I often do, then I am in the zone where you weight the cost of the drone against the effort to recover it in case of a crash.  There is no access to that area, other than on foot, breaking your own trail through rocks and brush.  Everything here has either fangs, stingers, needles, thorns, horns, teeth, claws or all of the above.  And 1 mile of horizontal travel may require 3 or 4 miles of up and down traversing of terrain.  I have thought about this a lot, but in the end I just go fly.  I have prepared myself as much as possible to control the drone in an unexpected situation, but bottom line is, what will be, will be.

Genghis9 Posted at 2017-10-19 14:50
Agree, assuming you don't experience some kind of catastrophic failure i.e. a prop falling off, then you need two extremely important elements to maintaining aircraft control and dealing with a problem.
1-Good Situational Awareness (SA), the better your SA the better you will do
2-Experience, coupled with knowledge, the more you are practiced the more your responses are quick and timely (muscle memory is key here too)

"A good drone operator will not only practice good camera & UAV control but also responses to urgent situations and equipment procedures & controls. "


I second this big time.

Nigel_ Posted at 2017-10-19 11:38
"Grant it, if the copter is out-of-sight, non working radar screen and RTH is out of order, man this spells trouble."

No trouble at all!  Just look at the live video feed and fly it back FPV

"No trouble at all!  Just look at the live video feed and fly it back FPV"

If you're lucky enough to have a working camera.  

Kneepuck Posted at 2017-10-19 16:02
I was highly motivated to learn how to fly the drone home simply because of the terrain here.  When I fly across the canyon, which I often do, then I am in the zone where you weight the cost of the drone against the effort to recover it in case of a crash.  There is no access to that area, other than on foot, breaking your own trail through rocks and brush.  Everything here has either fangs, stingers, needles, thorns, horns, teeth, claws or all of the above.  And 1 mile of horizontal travel may require 3 or 4 miles of up and down traversing of terrain.  I have thought about this a lot, but in the end I just go fly.  I have prepared myself as much as possible to control the drone in an unexpected situation, but bottom line is, what will be, will be.

'Everything here has either fangs, stingers, needles, thorns, horns, teeth, claws or all of the above.'

Sounds like my living room.

Geebax Posted at 2017-10-19 16:19
'Everything here has either fangs, stingers, needles, thorns, horns, teeth, claws or all of the above.'

Sounds like my living room.

I didn't know you lived in a zoo

Genghis9 Posted at 2017-10-19 16:41
I didn't know you lived in a zoo

Oh, very much so. At present 13 dogs, one Shetland pony, and a scrum of parrots.

Geebax Posted at 2017-10-19 16:46
Oh, very much so. At present 13 dogs, one Shetland pony, and a scrum of parrots.

Good grief

Most advices here at near flyaway topics end with: 'You should switch to ATTI mode, but you need to practice it a lot".

I would challenge the thought behind that and suggest it is quite wrong.
First, Phantoms don't "fly away" but there are cases where disoriented or confused pilots may mistakenly believe their Phantom is flying away.
But if that is due to a compass error causing the Phantom to ignore GPS data, there is no point switching to atti mode, because the Phantom is already in atti mode.  That's why it is drifting with the wind.

Flicking the flight mode switch to Atti mode will make no difference.
In fact putting the switch in Atti can make things more difficult.
When/if the compass error goes away, you would not have the benefit of GPS position holding.

The discussion of how to prevent compass errors in the first place would be much more relevant and useful.
The solution to that is to not mess with compass calibrations and never launch from steel or reinforced concrete surfaces.

Pilot Error..thank goodness I have practiced in atti mode flying and landings in gusty winds, yesterday I was flying in a area full of very close obstacles on all sides that would love to eat a drone or two when I noticed wind drift  moving the UAS towards a obstacle a quick glance at the display showed the drone in atti mode with 16 sats for GPS, quick check showed my switch in atti mode on the controller, moved the UAS out of harms way and switched back to P, the skill of flying in atti mode gave me the time I needed to avoid objects as well as time to resolve the issue.

Genghis9 Posted at 2017-10-19 16:41
I didn't know you lived in a zoo

I was thinking he must live with a bunch of women.

Irate Retro Posted at 2017-10-19 21:15
I was thinking he must live with a bunch of women.

ewe ouch...you live dangerously my friend...not sure but I'm thinking this is not exactly a male only forum...better put some armor on

You also really like living up to your namesake and avatar too don't ya

RMJovo Posted at 2017-10-19 17:29
Pilot Error..thank goodness I have practiced in atti mode flying and landings in gusty winds, yesterday I was flying in a area full of very close obstacles on all sides that would love to eat a drone or two when I noticed wind drift  moving the UAS towards a obstacle a quick glance at the display showed the drone in atti mode with 16 sats for GPS, quick check showed my switch in atti mode on the controller, moved the UAS out of harms way and switched back to P, the skill of flying in atti mode gave me the time I needed to avoid objects as well as time to resolve the issue.

THAT'S what I'm talkin about!

Kneepuck Posted at 2017-10-19 16:02
I was highly motivated to learn how to fly the drone home simply because of the terrain here.  When I fly across the canyon, which I often do, then I am in the zone where you weight the cost of the drone against the effort to recover it in case of a crash.  There is no access to that area, other than on foot, breaking your own trail through rocks and brush.  Everything here has either fangs, stingers, needles, thorns, horns, teeth, claws or all of the above.  And 1 mile of horizontal travel may require 3 or 4 miles of up and down traversing of terrain.  I have thought about this a lot, but in the end I just go fly.  I have prepared myself as much as possible to control the drone in an unexpected situation, but bottom line is, what will be, will be.

Sounds like a case of "adrenaline junkie". Buy a Inspire 2, that is like an overdose.

Thanks for sharing your ideas and experience. Hopefully more new pilots could read this post timely.

Kneepuck Posted at 2017-10-19 16:02
I was highly motivated to learn how to fly the drone home simply because of the terrain here.  When I fly across the canyon, which I often do, then I am in the zone where you weight the cost of the drone against the effort to recover it in case of a crash.  There is no access to that area, other than on foot, breaking your own trail through rocks and brush.  Everything here has either fangs, stingers, needles, thorns, horns, teeth, claws or all of the above.  And 1 mile of horizontal travel may require 3 or 4 miles of up and down traversing of terrain.  I have thought about this a lot, but in the end I just go fly.  I have prepared myself as much as possible to control the drone in an unexpected situation, but bottom line is, what will be, will be.

I love canyons too! In canyons and tight spots I usually fly in ATTI mode with OA and VPS turned off and RTH set to hover. In such places ATTI mode is your best friend. Here is an example:

OOO Posted at 2017-12-6 22:28
I love canyons too! In canyons and tight spots I usually fly in ATTI mode with OA and VPS turned off and RTH set to hover. In such places ATTI mode is your best friend. Here is an example:

https://youtu.be/kYuTjgRW_JA

Very nice.  Here is one of mine.  I would love to have as much water as you have, but there is some.  If you look closely, you can see a black line running down the rock in places.  That is the water.  Mine is not so well edited as yours, and has no music, but at least it has a canyon.

Kneepuck Posted at 2017-12-7 10:36
Very nice.  Here is one of mine.  I would love to have as much water as you have, but there is some.  If you look closely, you can see a black line running down the rock in places.  That is the water.  Mine is not so well edited as yours, and has no music, but at least it has a canyon.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dck9kdZPsos

Thanks. Did you have any connection problem?  ATTI mode or regular mode?

OOO Posted at 2017-12-7 15:39
Thanks. Did you have any connection problem?  ATTI mode or regular mode?

No connection problems.  I was at the base of the lower falls, so I stood back far enough to have clear line of sight to the drone.  I was in P mode at the time, and never lost satellite signal.