I used my new Mavic 2 Pro on my hiking vacation in India. On my last flight my drone crashed into a rock i thinkt due to a bug:
As you can see on the flight record witch I added I was flying into a valley. The connection got weak so I decided to use the RTH. First everything went good, I still had 27% battery for 300m hight and 1000m distance, so with no wind on this day it should not be a problem. The drone was flying to a big rock an I was thinking "no problem, with all the sensors it will stop and fly over the rock". As the connection was weak I let the RTH fly. Then suddenly a text like "obstacle avoidance disabled" was showing on the screen. About 2 seconds later the connection was completely lost, so i could not interfere. The drone must have crashed against the rock. At the time of the crash the battery was 25%, so enough to return to home.

Obstacle avoidance was set to ON, also in RTH.
There was enough light.
The drone was NOT in sport mode.
The drone was not flying to the sun.
The temperature was about 5°C.

So why did the drone disables the obstacle avoidance itself? Is this a bug? Is the obstacle avoidance disabled when the battery reaches 25%?
I bought a expensive drone with lots of sensors so why do they disable them self when i really need them?

Since my drone is crashed an lost in the mountain (no chance to collect it, due to very dangerous crashing point) due a bug i think, is there any chance to get a new drone from DJI?
Actually I really do not know why it does disable the obstacle avoidance itself.
Did I do something wrong?

Greeds, Asas

There’s always a chance to get a new drone from DJI, they have stock right now.
However, to get a free replacement, very slim chance. Obstacle avoidance can be disabled if the vision sensors aren’t working due to lighting conditions. Too dark and it won’t work, too bright may be as well.
Open a case with DJI and have them go through the logs and everything. They will likely just offer a 15% discount on replacement drone only.

Sorry for the crash.I think your return to home altitude was too low (as well as remaining battery level and you where flying too far).
Did you subscribe to dji care?

Hi, thanks for reaching the DJI Forum. We do feel sad about what happened with your last flight. For us to conduct an investigation of what happened, we suggest contacting support@dji.com. Should you have any concerns, don't hesitate to reach us. We're here to help you. Thank you.

you should NOT rely on obsticalbe avoidance. Learn how to fly without any aid. This could be easly avoided...

Fre Mo Posted at 11-1 00:39
Sorry for the crash.I think your return to home altitude was too low (as well as remaining battery level and you where flying too far).
Did you subscribe to dji care?

But if the return to home altitude is to low then the obstracle avoidance should correct it, otherwise this would be useless. I think the battery is not a problem. As you can see it could make 200m with 2% of battery so with 25% left 900m should not be a problem.
No i did not subscribe, anyway it would not works since the drone is somewhere in the mountain.

nivong Posted at 11-1 02:51
you should NOT rely on obsticalbe avoidance. Learn how to fly without any aid. This could be easly avoided...

When connection is lost or weak RTH is the best thing to safe the drone I think. You pay a lot of money for this aid so why not use it. it is not relying when you use safety features when you have a problem. But thanks for you NOT help.

nivong Posted at 11-1 02:51
you should NOT rely on obsticalbe avoidance. Learn how to fly without any aid. This could be easly avoided...

When connection is lost or weak RTH is the best thing to safe the drone I think. You pay a lot of money for this aid so why not use it. it is not relying when you use safety features when you have a problem. But thanks for you NOT help.

nivong Posted at 11-1 02:51
you should NOT rely on obsticalbe avoidance. Learn how to fly without any aid. This could be easly avoided...

When connection is lost or weak RTH is the best thing to safe the drone I think. You pay a lot of money for this aid so why not use it. it is not relying when you use safety features when you have a problem. But thanks for you NOT help.

Maybe with the Apas engaged the aircraft should have avoided the mountain? But I think when you press RTH the drone fly straight forward the home position, that’s why it is required to set the appropriate RTH Altitude each time.
Didn’t you see on the app screen that the drone will crash and press the pause button?

asas19 Posted at 11-1 03:30
When connection is lost or weak RTH is the best thing to safe the drone I think. You pay a lot of money for this aid so why not use it. it is not relying when you use safety features when you have a problem. But thanks for you NOT help.

Did you read the manual? These drones don't fly themselves at this time. Maybe in the future but not right now. You were the pilot so you should have had LOS. You crashed your drone because of your piloting abilities.

That really sucks about what happened... I find it, for me anyway, as a best practice to only look at the obstacle avoidance as a backup safety feature as opposed to a main feature. technical  yes, it's supposed to see an object and stop you from hitting something. But it's also an electronic system that can possibly fail or report it fine falsely. I do not think I would ever fly towards anything with the mindset to just let it keep going because it will auto fix itself over manually taking the controls.   

I don't agree with others being condescending though, that's just uncalled for and not needed. The guy already crashed his drone so he doesn't need salt in the wounds.. With the way they are advertised it's easy to see how someone would rely on the obstacle avoidance to always protect them.

Hopefully DJI will replace it for you.. It's most likely going to be an uphill battle since you cannot recover the AC for them so go in to it expecting the worst and hope for the best.

It looks like you lost orientation of your craft, if you think you are going to use or need RTH , then before you fly just set RTH higher than any obstacle, as the pilot of the craft, you share a responsibility how you fly how you manage your flight, from what you say you were 100% depending on OA, this is not being responsible, you should have flight log in your device, if you want to upload this.

Fre Mo Posted at 11-1 04:10
Maybe with the Apas engaged the aircraft should have avoided the mountain? But I think when you press RTH the drone fly straight forward the home position, that’s why it is required to set the appropriate RTH Altitude each time.
Didn’t you see on the app screen that the drone will crash and press the pause button?

The Problem was, that the connection was very weak, so I had to less time to react.

hallmark007 Posted at 11-1 05:27
It looks like you lost orientation of your craft, if you think you are going to use or need RTH , then before you fly just set RTH higher than any obstacle, as the pilot of the craft, you share a responsibility how you fly how you manage your flight, from what you say you were 100% depending on OA, this is not being responsible, you should have flight log in your device, if you want to upload this.

the Problem was that I got weak connection, so I thought the safest thing would be to use the RTH since there should be no problem. I thought the height is not a probleme because of the avoidance system. I am flying a lot an it was the first time such thing happend, normally I dont need the avoidance system, but when you need it for safety it should actually work.  

HedsIc Posted at 11-1 04:51
That really sucks about what happened... I find it, for me anyway, as a best practice to only look at the obstacle avoidance as a backup safety feature as opposed to a main feature. technical  yes, it's supposed to see an object and stop you from hitting something. But it's also an electronic system that can possibly fail or report it fine falsely. I do not think I would ever fly towards anything with the mindset to just let it keep going because it will auto fix itself over manually taking the controls.   

I don't agree with others being condescending though, that's just uncalled for and not needed. The guy already crashed his drone so he doesn't need salt in the wounds.. With the way they are advertised it's easy to see how someone would rely on the obstacle avoidance to always protect them.

Yes with only 30% battery left I thought RTH would be the safest way. And since the advertise the whole avoidance system so much i thought it would be very safe. I still do not get it why it was writing "disabled" just before the connection got lost. If i would have known it a little bit earlier I would have been able to react.

rolling56 Posted at 11-1 04:35
Did you read the manual? These drones don't fly themselves at this time. Maybe in the future but not right now. You were the pilot so you should have had LOS. You crashed your drone because of your piloting abilities.

Yes I read the manual. There it says the following:


So i think your post is inappropriate and not really helping. You just want to point out that you are so smart. But this forum should be to support people, not to humble them, so please keep it to yourself.

It sucks that you have lost your drone.   I am always skeptical when flying over large mountains/etc with any of the 'aids', like avoidance.  The feature is nice to have, but with the track record of them, you still shouldn't rely on them.

To me, it seems the drone was faulty.  There was plenty of light.  That is just my opinion an observance.  I have been staying on the ground (Not flying) until the new firmware is out.  There is just too many questionable items going on with this firmware.  It's not stable..  (Again, my opinion).

asas19 Posted at 11-1 06:30
Yes I read the manual. There it says the following:
[view_image]

ya we all have our opinions on others but the key word in the manual is "attempts". It doesn't say failsafe....and it is not a bug.

rolling56 Posted at 11-1 07:07
ya we all have our opinions on others but the key word in the manual is "attempts". It doesn't say failsafe....and it is not a bug.

Since there was „obstracle avoidance disabled“ written on the screen I want to know why it was disabled. There wasent even an „attempt“ because it disabled itself. So it can still be a bug.

asas19 Posted at 11-1 07:14
Since there was „obstracle avoidance disabled“ written on the screen I want to know why it was disabled. There wasent even an „attempt“ because it disabled itself. So it can still be a bug.

Regardless normal people don't run into mountain sides on purpose. The knee jerk reaction would be to pull up as to not run into it and you call it a bug? I'm done have a nice recovery.

asas19 Posted at 11-1 07:14
Since there was „obstracle avoidance disabled“ written on the screen I want to know why it was disabled. There wasent even an „attempt“ because it disabled itself. So it can still be a bug.

If you want to have more insight on what happened, upload your flightlogs.

https://www.phantomhelp.com/logviewer/Upload/

Sorry to read of your crash. Be sure to set RTH altitude to clear any obstacles in the drones environment before take off next time.

asas19 Posted at 11-1 03:30
When connection is lost or weak RTH is the best thing to safe the drone I think. You pay a lot of money for this aid so why not use it. it is not relying when you use safety features when you have a problem. But thanks for you NOT help.

not sure why you posted that 3 times. But the anwser is no it is not. You should always have an eye on the drone and should always be aware of your suroundings. RTH is only good when the connection is lost with the controller...
Next time check your RTH height and plan ahead before flying.

asas19 Posted at 11-1 06:30
Yes I read the manual. There it says the following:
[view_image]

You are right, the drone shouldn’t crashed in the mountain, so dji must replace your drone from these clues.
Did you check in the app that the obstacle avoidance for rth was on?Do you have the video with flight data overlaid?

Let`s discuss when we see the flightrecord, flight data sometimes tells us more than words....

Pilot error 100% in my opinion.
Sorry for your crash and the loss of your drone.
I know exactly how you feel! I also lost my first spark due to newbie mistake
I hope that you can get back in the air soon and learn from this mistake!

Fly safely all
Alex

nivong Posted at 11-1 09:29
not sure why you posted that 3 times. But the anwser is no it is not. You should always have an eye on the drone and should always be aware of your suroundings. RTH is only good when the connection is lost with the controller...
Next time check your RTH height and plan ahead before flying.

The Connection was lost with the Controller

Keule Posted at 11-1 08:20
If you want to have more insight on what happened, upload your flightlogs.

https://www.phantomhelp.com/logviewer/Upload/

I posted a Video of the flight Record in my First Post.

Fre Mo Posted at 11-1 10:25
You are right, the drone shouldn’t crashed in the mountain, so dji must replace your drone from these clues.
Did you check in the app that the obstacle avoidance for rth was on?Do you have the video with flight data overlaid?

Yes obstacle avoidance was set to on. I uploaded a Video of the flight record on my First Post.

asas19 Posted at 11-1 16:57
I posted a Video of the flight Record in my First Post.

That video is useless to get reliable infos.

Ok... Most People in this Forum are just here to let other People know that they are better than otheres.... I do Not Need any more comments like that. I just was looking for a answer why the avoidance disabled itself, so this wont happen again to other people aswell. That is actually what you should do when an accident happens. So unless you have an explanation why the System was switched off, please Go away and bash other People.

Keule Posted at 11-1 17:00
That video is useless to get reliable infos.

Ok, i will try That when I am at Home. Tranks

rolling56 Posted at 2018-11-1 04:35
Did you read the manual? These drones don't fly themselves at this time. Maybe in the future but not right now. You were the pilot so you should have had LOS. You crashed your drone because of your piloting abilities.

Yo, you need to calm down there Rolling.  I had my Mavic 2 return to home when it was in clear line of site.  You should stop with the knee jerk assumptions.,  jerk.

remote.aviator Posted at 5-25 03:29
Yo, you need to calm down there Rolling.  I had my Mavic 2 return to home when it was in clear line of site.  You should stop with the knee jerk assumptions.,  jerk.

Troll! i made that comment Nov 1,2018

BobB Posted at 5-25 05:06
Troll! i made that comment Nov 1,2018

Says the guy who trolled.

part of the issue is dji does sell these drones are being safe and capable of doing things somewhat beyond their actual abilities so i can see where the confusion can arise from...this however, doesnt excuse you responsibility as a pilot..

good way  to think about it like Tesla Autopilot when you think of DJI's obstacle avoidance and failsafes, yes it maybe very capable system that can save your butt majority of the time but it can also result in crashes itself if you are negligent as a driver or pilot because have to remember, these systems work using mathematical formulas and fixed functions... the real world doesn't always comply to what these systems are trained on...

the side of a mountain that about to crash into may look like side of a mountain or may look like wide open area to computer vision depending on a near infinite number of reasons..

asas19 Posted at 2018-11-1 03:26
But if the return to home altitude is to low then the obstracle avoidance should correct it, otherwise this would be useless. I think the battery is not a problem. As you can see it could make 200m with 2% of battery so with 25% left 900m should not be a problem.
No i did not subscribe, anyway it would not works since the drone is somewhere in the mountain.

I am sorry to voice here that DJI does not do software development in house. They source their software development. And yes as you  see here the poor quality of their drone behaviour during a risky maneouver. You must ensure that in such altitudes, minimum height of > 100 meters must be maintained to clear from any land obstacles or even higher. There is a misconception among done users that while the drone is very high, risk is very high. This is absolutely wrong . In fact the opposite is true. You will get a stable GPS lock at higher altitudes.

Mine did the same thing two days ago.  I have never disabled obstacle ovoidance and yet mine crashed into a building.  That is a crushing feeling when you see it happen.

A few things could’ve happened there. Obstacle avoidance does not work over a certain altitude(read manual page 22 “  The Vision System is only effective when the aircraft is at an altitude of 0.5 to 50 meters.“). It might also be that the battery is low and the drone sees that it has to return home quickly so it switched RTH mode into emergency mode which disables OA do it can RTH as quickly as it can(30% battery isn’t a lot of battery especially if it had to descend from 300m)

Anyways I do not recommend relying on OA, only use it as failsafe when you can’t see something, OA system can fail too(and DJI has a disclaimer that they’re not responsible). If you see an obstacle it’s better to take manual control even in low signal condition, worst thing that could happen is you lose signal and RTH continues.