I lost my mavic pro very recently too. 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 fails 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!

Forced landing isn’t at 20 percent. You should be landed by 20 percent, not coming home. Post your flight log.

I did the same previously and it can still come home safely and with full control. This time is really something going wrong.

You were at 338 meters. That it why it went into landing at 20 percent.

Can’t you see the battery life bar? It shows exactly when events will happen and you were at 1000 feet when it got to forced landing. Operator error for sure.

When I look at these pictures, the drone seems very smart and responsible to me.

I see a drone at 338 meters height from its take off point, with a maximum descent rate of 3 meter per second it will take nearly 2 full minutes to get back to the ground, under ideal circumstances.

In the last picture you have 12% battery left, which accumulates to an estimate of 2:48 remaining flight time. If it would start a critical battery landing at 10% which would give an estimated flighttime of 2:15, from 338 meter up, it would have left a very, very, very thin margin from just dropping out of the sky...



( I have to learn to type quicker, got ninja'ed by Jeff with an 8 minute margin )

losbol explains the situation correctly and well. No doubt dji has the same observations and on this basis i would agree that pilot error is the apparent cause. why cant you fetch your drone - looks like it was not very far away from you?

losbol explains the situation correctly and well. No doubt dji has the same observations and on this basis i would agree that pilot error is the apparent cause. why cant you fetch your drone - looks like it was not very far away from you?

still flying at 338m height when at 30% battery.....pretty clear why it did what it did.

Paying attention to all your readings and not relying on the comfort of auto return would of saved this bird.

Sorry you lost it but its not right to bash DJI for this.

Sorry to read your post. I managed to get the case number via the forum info. Please kindly find the data analysis result as below:

1.The aircraft was working in Sports mode and responded to RC command well.
2. At t=06:14 h=338.4m d=499.2m, battery=30%, the APP prompted "The remaining battery is only enough for RTH" and the RTH was triggered due to Low Battery. At t=06:25, the RTH was canceled by the pilot.
3. At t=08:49 h=338.7m d=674.2m battery=20 %, Landing was triggered due to Low Battery and then the aircraft was lost.
Just as the screenshots you offered, the battery is not enough to go home.

Conclusion: Flyaway during automated descending at low battery capacity. Non-warranty.
Our colleague has made it clear and we're sorry it is not a warranty case. I understand your feeling, and have forwarded this to the designated team for further follow-up. They will contact you soon. Hope we can figure it out soon.

The final move of the aircraft should be return home but not auto landing even the user cannot control it. I'm pretty sure if it returns home (even I cannot control it) it will be safe. But auto land and that user cannot control or stop is very dangerous. I was very panic and depressed that I will kill someone. I hope your designated team would give me a reasonable follow up but not keep saying it's user fault only.

LoSBoL Posted at 2018-2-28 05:37
When I look at these pictures, the drone seems very smart and responsible to me.

I see a drone at 338 meters height from its take off point, with a maximum descent rate of 3 meter per second it will take nearly 2 full minutes to get back to the ground, under ideal circumstances.

At 20%, which has an estimated flightime of 4:30 (270s), my distance (height + distance) was 1006 meter. According to the normal speed of  30km/hr, I should be still able to fly 2249 meters. However, when it start auto landing, I was panic and quickly manually fly it home. In the meantime, I have clicked 100 times of cancel landing but it never worked. And then I was thinking it probably would descend to a certain height and return home automatically. I flied to a distance of 483m and 222m height and wait for a minute and until height became 90 meter. I realized it wasn't the case and it won't stop so I was panic to push throttle and find somewhere safe to land. At the end it crashed/landed somewhere that I could not retrieve anymore. I admitted it was some user mistake of waiting and expecting it to return home. You probably will think I have lose control and there might be opportunity to make it back. If you experience yourself  with this kind of anxiety and distressed, I guess everyone would perform similarly. Not to mention I have plenty of fly experience.

Unfortunately on this rare occasion I have to concur with DJI.  It is a clear case of user/pilot error. You should have been bringing the drone back towards you way before the battery reaches 20%. You should be very close and starting the landing process before 20%. Also you were clearly out of line of sight of the drone which is another error on your part.

Honestly if you have as much flight experience as you claim then you should know that what you have been doing is taking the flights to the absolute extreme limits leaving no margin for error. We are all human and taking it as far as you did with as low battery levels as you did is just asking for trouble.

I am sorry for your loss but it is completely user error and you won't get anywhere with DJI on this. So just chalk it up to experience and buy a new drone and don't make such a mistake again!

The thing is that I have plenty similar flight record at 12-15% and the aircraft never auto land. That's why I was confident that time I can call it home at 20% and it just auto landing and lose control. I admitted that I'm not the play safe person and sometimes like to push the limit. Did I really push the limit at 20% battery? Our mobile phone can still use for few hours at 20% battery not to mention the aircraft can still fly for 2000 meters according to my calculation. Few friends have lost the confident to DJI now too and they have other experience of failure.

1. A friend play Quickshot mode and crashed into tree even stop button has been triggered. Flight record clearly shown he pressed button before crash but DJI insisted he pressed after crashing.
2. A friend controller USB plug has been verified broken by us, sent to DJI for repair and they said not broken, need to pay the return fee.

All I feel is that they try to push responsibility to user and avoid compensation.

Back to my case, I think if the aircraft firmware is to force return home and not force landing, my aircraft would be safe. Why force landing but not force  return home at 20%? If you check the forum and many people lost their aircraft in similar situation too but DJI choose to ignore and not changing the firmware. It is because if they make the aircraft firmware to force landing and crashed, they can ask people to buy again and they can earn money. Quite a scam to me.

No one can wake up a sleeping person.

djiuser_KFJ3ZIPPdigz Posted at 2018-2-28 20:54
At 20%, which has an estimated flightime of 4:30 (270s), my distance (height + distance) was 1006 meter. According to the normal speed of  30km/hr, I should be still able to fly 2249 meters. However, when it start auto landing, I was panic and quickly manually fly it home. In the meantime, I have clicked 100 times of cancel landing but it never worked. And then I was thinking it probably would descend to a certain height and return home automatically. I flied to a distance of 483m and 222m height and wait for a minute and until height became 90 meter. I realized it wasn't the case and it won't stop so I was panic to push throttle and find somewhere safe to land. At the end it crashed/landed somewhere that I could not retrieve anymore. I admitted it was some user mistake of waiting and expecting it to return home. You probably will think I have lose control and there might be opportunity to make it back. If you experience yourself  with this kind of anxiety and distressed, I guess everyone would perform similarly. Not to mention I have plenty of fly experience.

I am sorry you lost your Mavic, and I can imagine that the critical battery landing procedure came unexpected at 20%.

The Mavic however is better at calculations then you are, and by its calculations it started the low battery RTH at the 'H' on the batterybar. I'm sorry to say, but if you didn't cancel that, it would have made it home with about 4 minutes to spare.

The normal speed of 30 km/h is horizontal speed, not its descending speed, which is limited to 3m/s or about 10 km/h under ideal circumstances.

The batterybar is your friend, the 'H' on the batterybar is a sum of the aircrafts calculations distance and height from homepoint, and what time is needed to get back home, you've basically ignored that by cancelling out its timely return to home. Also, RTH always flies horizontal to Home before it descends.  Al these limitations are found in the manual, and it is up to you to fly within these limitations, or else the aircrafts failsafe will kick in.

LoSBoL Posted at 2018-3-1 00:28
I am sorry you lost your Mavic, and I can imagine that the critical battery landing procedure came unexpected at 20%.
The Mavic however is better at calculations then you are, and by its calculations it started the low battery RTH at the 'H' on the batterybar. I'm sorry to say, but if you didn't cancel that, it would have made it home with about 4 minutes to spare.
The normal speed of 30 km/h is horizontal speed, not its descending speed, which is limited to 3m/s or about 10 km/h under ideal circumstances.

If the mavic knew it was the last chance I can return home, it should force itself to return home and disable all the cancel function not matter how. Not wait until it cannot go home and start auto landing and at this point disable all my control. At least give me a control so I can land somewhere safe but not making me panic. To me it's still the DJI firmware issue.

djiuser_KFJ3ZIPPdigz Posted at 2018-3-1 01:07
If the mavic knew it was the last chance I can return home, it should force itself to return home and disable all the cancel function not matter how. Not wait until it cannot go home and start auto landing and at this point disable all my control. At least give me a control so I can land somewhere safe but not making me panic. To me it's still the DJI firmware issue.

There is no 'If', The Mavic knew it was the last chance it could return home...
And I'm sorry to say that you should have known also when the craft told you "The remaining battery is only enough for RTH".

The reason you 'can' cancel that particular RTH is to give you an opportunity to land elsewhere instead of at the homepoint.
The reason you 'can't' cancel a critical battery landing is because DJI doesn't want drones falling from the sky at terminal velocity.

LoSBoL Posted at 2018-3-1 00:28
I am sorry you lost your Mavic, and I can imagine that the critical battery landing procedure came unexpected at 20%.
The Mavic however is better at calculations then you are, and by its calculations it started the low battery RTH at the 'H' on the batterybar. I'm sorry to say, but if you didn't cancel that, it would have made it home with about 4 minutes to spare.
The normal speed of 30 km/h is horizontal speed, not its descending speed, which is limited to 3m/s or about 10 km/h under ideal circumstances.

My height and distance at 20% battery was 339 m and 671 m. Say if the descending speed is 3 m/s and horizontal speed is 8.3 m/s , the time need to return home is 339/3 + 671/8.3 = 193 sec. The last calculated flying time for 20% was 4.44 min which was about 266 sec. So it still had plenty of time to force come home but not force landing.

djiuser_KFJ3ZIPPdigz Posted at 2018-3-1 01:33
My height and distance at 20% battery was 339 m and 671 m. Say if the descending speed is 3 m/s and horizontal speed is 8.3 m/s , the time need to return home is 339/3 + 671/8.3 = 193 sec. The last calculated flying time for 20% was 4.44 min which was about 266 sec. So it still had plenty of time to force come home but not force landing.

It would have forced landing on route to RTH if it started its RTH at 20%, because you wouldn't have made home before the battery hit 10% causing a critical battery landing.

To put it very bluntly, The moment you cancelled out the low battery RTH you waived DJI's responsibility to get the craft home safely and took the full responsibility on to yourself to land the aircraft safely.

I can understand that, in your case, you've rather wanted that the aircraft took full control and alleviate you from any responsibility. But like I said in my very first reply, the craft acted responsibly, more so then the pilot did in this case, especially given you chose to cancel out its RTH procedure.

Appreciate your patience. I will continue to shout until DJI give me a satisfying compensation. It's a very costly item and just gone by second. Very painful.

djiuser_KFJ3ZIPPdigz Posted at 2018-3-1 02:35
Appreciate your patience. I will continue to shout until DJI give me a satisfying compensation. It's a very costly item and just gone by second. Very painful.

I hope you will be able to get a nice discount.

Why weren't you able to find the drone?

LoSBoL Posted at 2018-3-1 05:01
I hope you will be able to get a nice discount.

Why weren't you able to find the drone?

Not sure why I can't find it. After it drops, we went to the spot and no sight of it. We searched around the trees, the building and we can't find any. Probably saw it crashed landing and took it. I was in Malaysia and you know there were many people around. That's why I was asking if DJI would have know if someone turn on the aircraft again and track the location. No answer from their side.

I also realized I had the same issue as https://forum.dji.com/forum.php? ... p;page=5#pid1204965  (post #162) the video gets a lot of distortion while I was flying in Malaysia. The whole thread was discussing about the issues of new firmware.

Also the auto land issue has been discussed a year ago and DJI done nothing about it.

https://forum.dji.com/forum.php? ... 86&pbc=mF6h4ZTt

In my flight log, I've only found one or two failed to cancel landing (which when I pressed stop button). I have pressed for at least 20-30 times but only showed two. DJI want to destroys the evidence that I try to cancel land as well?

djiuser_KFJ3ZIPPdigz Posted at 2018-3-1 18:27
In my flight log, I've only found one or two failed to cancel landing (which when I pressed stop button). I have pressed for at least 20-30 times but only showed two. DJI want to destroys the evidence that I try to cancel land as well?

Sir, as DJI Susan had mentioned on the 2 point above, at t=06:14 h=338.4m d=499.2m, battery=30%, the APP prompted "The remaining battery is only enough for RTH" and the RTH was triggered due to Low Battery. At t=06:25, the RTH was cancelled by the pilot.
You had cancelled the RTH when the drone wanted to initiate it. After, the drone entered to critical battery landing according to the current situation. Please note that the landing is not able to cancel when the drone is at critical landing mode since the remaining battery can only maintain for the landing. This point has been mentioned in the manual. You might need to learn from it, be cautious about the battery level.

Critically low battery level should be 10% but not 20%. As I mentioned, at 20% I still have plenty of time to come home, why did it try to force landing and not returning home? Try to crash my aircraft and buy another one from you?

https://mavicpilots.com/threads/ ... ery-response.13632/

See post 10. It can still land safely at 0%. I'm not trying to push to this limit. But force landing at 20% and kill my aircraft so I can buy another from you? really?

DJI, do you dare to do the experiment by flying the same height and distance as I did at 20%, you can program without force landing, then press return home. Let it return to you and see how much battery left? Post on Youtube. Prove me wrong DJI!

djiuser_KFJ3ZIPPdigz Posted at 2018-3-1 20:50
DJI, do you dare to do the experiment by flying the same height and distance as I did at 20%, you can program without force landing, then press return home. Let it return to you and see how much battery left? Post on Youtube. Prove me wrong DJI!

Sir, the drone will calculate and determine the proper time for the safe landing, there will not be a certain time for all circumstances because of the altitude etc.. And at the same time, your case had escalated to the manager. Please pay attention to the email or phone call.

Yes, I got the email last night and the reply was the same. Said my flight under control before 30%, then at critical battery I didn't do this bla bla. If the answer is the same again, no point of email or calling me. I will try to seek other legal advise of my case. I would lodge this dangerous case to government and you are out of the market.

djiuser_KFJ3ZIPPdigz Posted at 2018-3-1 14:41
Not sure why I can't find it. After it drops, we went to the spot and no sight of it. We searched around the trees, the building and we can't find any. Probably saw it crashed landing and took it. I was in Malaysia and you know there were many people around. That's why I was asking if DJI would have know if someone turn on the aircraft again and track the location. No answer from their side.

It might have landed on top of a building. Sorry for your loss

This has gone beyond the point of sympathy. It is now at the comedy level.

DJI prove me wrong by doing this

fly at 339 m (1112.2 feet) height and 674 m (2211.3 feet) distance, leave the battery to 21% and press return home. When it land just tell me how many percent battery left. If it only left 1% I will try you. No cheating, fly at normal or no wind. That day I have no wind and the temperature was 24-26 degree.

If you have more than 1% battery, then your firmware cause my mavic pro crash and compensate me.

LoSBoL Posted at 2018-2-28 05:37
When I look at these pictures, the drone seems very smart and responsible to me.

I see a drone at 338 meters height from its take off point, with a maximum descent rate of 3 meter per second it will take nearly 2 full minutes to get back to the ground, under ideal circumstances.

Would not the battery life degrades over the days/months so what you are able to do at one stage you won't be later on?

HenryHM Posted at 2018-3-4 04:14
Would not the battery life degrades over the days/months so what you are able to do at one stage you won't be later on?

I'd say yes, but still, the red portion of the dynamic batterybar which is one fifth of the total bar is a very prominent sign as of when you can expect a safety landing procedure to kick in.

LoSBoL Posted at 2018-3-4 04:33
I'd say yes, but still, the red portion of the dynamic batterybar which is one fifth of the total bar is a very prominent sign as of when you can expect a safety landing procedure to kick in.

it is safer then to RTH when it reaches 30%? or depends on how far you are away from the take off/ landing spot?

HenryHM Posted at 2018-3-4 04:36
it is safer then to RTH when it reaches 30%? or depends on how far you are away from the take off/ landing spot?

I think elevation (height) compared to takeoff point is the key in this one . drones move fast horizontally, vertically however speed is very limited.

The batterybar is dynamic, lowering height would have regained the normal 10% mandatory landing instead of 20%.

RTH procedure however does not account for that, because when pressing RTH the drone will move horizontal to above homepoint before descending.

LoSBoL Posted at 2018-3-4 04:48
I think elevation (heigt) compared to takeoff point is the key in this one . drones move fast horizontally, vertically however speed is very limited.

The batterybar is dynamic, lowering height would have regained the normal 10% mandatory landing instead of 20%.

Makes sense.. very advance piece of equipment Thank you

Additional, most  countries set height limitations in which you may fly. Usually 120 meter or 400ft. Within those boundaries a drone can land safely with the 10% critical battery level.
So if you fly below 120 meter, you'll never see a mandatory landing at 20%

The battery bar is your friend, keep an eye on it and you won't be caught by surprise.