Hi all,

I am sharing my horror story dealing with DJI tech support. My drone (Mavic 2 Zoom)  fall into ocean when I was taking a Quickshot. The incident was fully captured with the GoPro that I had on my head. The drone started few meters above the water and in front of me. Took the Quickshot and when it was trying to get back it dived into ocean, no manual control it was all by Quickshot.

So I contacted the technical support and gave them the flight data. I was sure that they will admit the fault. But to my surprise they said:
"The GPS signal was fine and the aircraft was piloted under Quick Shot mode;... The aircraft could not sense or avoid obstacles that are not within the detection range, please fly with caution... According to the analysis, the incident was caused by improper flight environment, please fly with caution. "


I pointed out that in the log barometer (IMU) is showing the height 8 meters while VPS is correctly detecting the ocean surface. To which Lydia from DJI tech support replied:

"when the aircraft was controlled to fly near the water or transparent surfaces, the aircraft's barometer would be affected "


This makes no sense, right! So the transparent surface affects barometer? And if they baroemter is inacurate and the drone dives into ocean it's not DJI's fault?


I shared the GoPro footage with them and I will try to share it here too. It was a really safe flying environment. Just be aware that DJI drones cannot fly over water and DJI tech support is non existant. They have just employed some people to reply to emails.


Luckily in Australia we have ACCC and consumers laws.

Hi, sorry to read the frustrations. I have the read the emails sent and received using your Forum account. Upon reading, they had already offered a 15% discount only for the lost parts and not for the Mavic 2 Zoom without charger and remote. We want also to stress out that the "send me a Mavic 2 Pro instead of Zoom" you require is not available, we are terribly sorry in letting you down. However, we're going to forward this with the designated team in re-evaluating. We appreciate your patience and understanding.

Sorry to read this. If right these drones are the worst Dji have made ewer.
Barometer is affected by pressure and nothing else.
You can upload the log from your device LogViewer and post back the link to it.
Would be good for others to see this.

Follow what g sig asked for and upload go pro video .

Not over makes no sense,  I have seen a few videos of them flying over the ocean!

DJI Diana Posted at 5-28 15:52
Hi, sorry to read the frustrations. I have the read the emails sent and received using your Forum account. Upon reading, they had already offered a 15% discount only for the lost parts and not for the Mavic 2 Zoom without charger and remote. We want also to stress out that the "send me a Mavic 2 Pro instead of Zoom" you require is not available, we are terribly sorry in letting you down. However, we're going to forward this with the designated team in re-evaluating. We appreciate your patience and understanding.

Haha, I bought the drone with %20 discount during an eBay sale and I and found out that it has inaccurate barometer! Interestingly on your Australian website you don't ask customers not to fly over water:
https://www.dji.com/au/flyingtips/au

In fact in the same page you also have a shot taken over water and you suggest taking footage of the Great Barrier Reef. I suggest you look into Australia regulations and consumer laws. False advertising is illegal in Australia.  

G_Sig Posted at 5-28 16:08
Sorry to read this. If right these drones are the worst Dji have made ewer.
Barometer is affected by pressure and nothing else.
You can upload the log from your device LogViewer and post back the link to it.

The log viewer link is:
https://www.phantomhelp.com/LogViewer/UJ5TRCDEQUYIQ2X5BRMX/

I am not sure how long they keep the link.

See IMU says 26.9ft and VPS says 6.2ft. VPS was very accurate. But barometer is a joke!

The GoPro footage:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/uawpy5f2ion305k/droneLost2.mp4?dl=0

I thought I am buying the best drone ever produced, a crash proof drone. But what a waste!

hallmark007 Posted at 5-28 16:36
Follow what g sig asked for and upload go pro video .

https://www.dropbox.com/s/uawpy5f2ion305k/droneLost2.mp4?dl=0

Do you think this environment is in anyway unsafe? DJI tech support initially blamed the waves:

"the height measured by the downward sensor was 0 m; all of that indicated that there were obstacles underneath the aircraft. The obstacles not just meant the man-made buildings, it might also be the water or the wave. And from the video you offered, it was also clear that the wave was great."

The wave must of have more than 8 meters if the barometer was accurate! This guys are a joke.

ENC DRONES Posted at 5-28 17:10
Not over makes no sense,  I have seen a few videos of them flying over the ocean!

Yes, I am sure I have seen a lot of those. I am sure DJI paid some Youtubers who did fly over water.

I am not worried about getting refund or replacement. That will happen according to Australia consumer protections. I am just disappointed with DJI. I can't trust them anymore.

AlxFlyMore Posted at 5-28 17:43
The log viewer link is:
https://www.phantomhelp.com/LogViewer/UJ5TRCDEQUYIQ2X5BRMX/

Sorry to say it but I looked at the video and that was enough for me.
You did not even set your antenna right, you did not watch your drone flying back.
The only thing you had to do was to move the left stick and the the drone will go up and stop.
I fly a lot over rivers sea and snow which all can foul the downward sensors but it newer failed for 2 years.
Sorry but I have to stand with Dji in this.

G_Sig Posted at 5-28 18:14
Sorry to say it but I looked at the video and that was enough for me.
You did not even set your antenna right, you did not watch your drone flying back.
The only thing you had to do was to move the left stick and the the drone will go up and stop.

Which DJI claim do you stand with? That the environment wasn't suitable? That there was an obstacle? That the barometer won't be accurate if the surface is transparent?   

How is antenna relevant? Of course the user can over ride but that's not the point! The point is that the barometer wasn't accurate and the sensor didn't stop the crash.

Hi AlxFlyMore,

Had a look at your log and video.

Flying low above water is a risk, as piloting a drone always have a sharp look out especially when software is in control of a drone (Quickshot mode).
Sensors can get confused over water reflections, bad signals ect.

Your started a Quickshot mode at :
26.2 feet baro height, 12.5 feet VPS height, distance away 36.1 feet
Quickshot ends at : 60.4 baro height, VPS height: out of range, distance 163.4 feet.
Craft flying back to begin position.
At 49.2 feet craft raises nose to reduce speed (that time approx 14 fs/s), baro height 30.5, VPS height 11.5.
At 40.2 feet speed almost zero, 4 feet from starting point and baro height 26.9.
So great returning to starting position.

My question (for DJI) is wich sensor is used for a Quickshot mode. My guess is the baro height info for flying away (plus higher) and returning back to in starting position.
If the VPS height is not used at all than it does explain why it went into the water.
I mean if you start a QS at altitude above VPS range it uses solely the baro height sensor, don`t think (not sure ofcourse) QS mode uses VPS height when within range and switching to baro height (out of VPS range) and switchin back to VPS heigt if in range again....
Baro height sensor is accurate within few feet, and changes a bit depending the flight conditions. Largest baro pressure changes are at low altitude, minor hysteresic effects on sensors are normal.
Flying back to start position QS ends at 26.2 feet, same as starting height your QS.
VPS height there 5.9 feet, so about 6 feet actual height (if sensored corerct) lower than the start, IMO all within tolerances.After ending QS the VPS height indicates 1.0, 0.7, 0.3, 0.0, drone pitched down and got some speed. Guess due to reflections of teh water starts to correct its position in P-GPS mode.

For the difference or comparison between baro height and VPS height take into account the take off position (at takeoff baro height is set to zero as reference) and the actual baro height of the sea wich is ofcourse lower. So the DJI reply about height difference is not correct.

If only you had looked at your drone all time....just pushing it up a bit on time and you had saved your MP2.

cheers
JJB

AlxFlyMore Posted at 5-28 17:46
https://www.dropbox.com/s/uawpy5f2ion305k/droneLost2.mp4?dl=0

Do you think this environment is in anyway unsafe? DJI tech support initially blamed the waves:

I suppose no point in me rehashing what others are saying, do I think there’s a responsibility on the user to use craft in a proper environment yes, it does ask you to do this in the manual. It’s not really up to me to say if your environment was suitable except to say environment is one of the biggest causes of crashed drones.
Is it part of your warranty I’m not so sure it is, but it’s certainly your responsibility. In your case I think is fair that dji show that it was pilot error caused by you, if they cannot and equally cannot find malfunction in your craft, then it is normal for dji to offer 30% discount, it should also be noted that what you say dji has said, has not been shown here, if this was a case of simply you could have saved craft from crashing, but for some reason we don’t yet know then maybe there is blame on either side.

I can understand your frustration, but can also see how granting warranty for something like this could start a free for all. Hopefully a second look will help your case, good luck .

I had a crash like 1 year before when DJI introduced Quickshots in Mavic Pro 1.
I was testing for the first time the Dronie mode . When automated flight started I expected an elevation of around 45Degrees angle. To my bad luck, the elevation angle  was much lower, therefore the drone was moving back (instead of back&up) and hit the top of a tree.

The frustrating thing for me is that when I realized the issue probably 1-2 seconds before the crash I tried to override the autonomous flight but pulling the left stick all the way up or right stick up to bring to closer.

Sadly the Drone did not obey and continued to its path towards the tree.

The only way to override the autonomous flight was to hit the PAUSE button, which I didn't.

I am not sure if autonomous  flight can be overridden using any of the command sticks today, but the PAUSE button should definitely work.  

For the record DJI did not cover the loss, although I believe that this was half user error, half DJI's because of the poorly Quickshot mode implementation. Had the control sticks worked, I would have saved the drone.  

Sorry to read what happened to your drone. Below is taken from page 22 of the Mavic 2 manual regarding how to safely operate your drone and the limitations of the VPS. Transparent surfaces such as water can cause the VPS to become erratic as it can't effectively detect the surface. It is therefore advisable to keep the drone relatively high (beyond VPS range) when over water or to switch off the VPS in the app. The optical flow through the VPS had clearly become erratic due to the environment you were flying in with VPS engaged at low altitude over the water and selecting an intelligent flight mode whereby VPS is required. You should always maintain VLOS of the drone too, especially when using auto flight modes such as quick shots - had you kept your eye on the drone you could have increased the throttle which would have cancelled the quick shot and ascended the drones altitude to prevent it from crashing into the water. Some learnings here and whilst I appreciate your frustration this crash was preventable with more knowledge of the drones limitations by simply reading the manual. And note that nothing that can fly is crash proof... even NASA spacecraft's.

AlxFlyMore Posted at 5-28 19:17
Which DJI claim do you stand with? That the environment wasn't suitable? That there was an obstacle? That the barometer won't be accurate if the surface is transparent?   

How is antenna relevant? Of course the user can over ride but that's not the point! The point is that the barometer wasn't accurate and the sensor didn't stop the crash.

What Dji is simply saying is that this is pilot error and I tend to say the same.
If the sensors were not right it's our the pilots to do something as in this case was easy
but you were not paying any attention to it and did nothing to correct it. Pilot error.
The antenna had nothing to do with this as you can't loose connection in 200m but
it show us that you did not pay any attention to what the manual say or you did not read it.
Again pilot error.

Having your antenna unfolded correctly is one of the most basic fundamentals. I mean, if I was DJI, I'd be wondering what else you've chosen to not do properly when it comes to the operation of a drone.

It didn't appear to go down in very deep water. Why didn't you attempt to wade out and find it? Wouldn't that have then been a possible DJI Refresh / Care claim then (assuming you have it).

I feel bad for you though. Losing a drone like this is my greatest fear!

JJB* Posted at 5-29 00:54
Hi AlxFlyMore,

Had a look at your log and video.

Fantastic analysis. Thanks for taking time to look at the log. You are pointing out an importing issue: how DJI measures the height. They haven't given me a number although I have pushed a lot. What they said is:

"... the height showing on the top of the app was the relative height according to the took-off point, it is a fusion height measured mainly via the barometer. "

In another email:

"And the VPS height we mentioned was measured by the infrared sensing system on the bottom of this aircraft. The height measured by the infrared sensing system was the distance between the aircraft and the obstacles underneath it. "

So they are being vague here and saying VPS height is considered but it's mainly baro which determines the height. From the logs they definitely know what the measured height was but they are not going to say it.

I definitely agree with you that only if I was looking at the drone. But after seeing the drone is coming close to me, I just trusted it will stay there. For Quickshot it's common for the users not to look at the drone to make the shot to look natural. It's in DJI videos as well. So they can't advertise something and then say the user should always look at the drone and have their fingers on the controller ready to take over.

Also DJI is advertising that the drone can go up to 8 km away which obviously means the user will be able to rely on the measured height.

I heard sudden change of air pressure can screw up the baro and DJI does not adaptively re adjust the baro. I believe this is what caused the crash and probably there was some changes in the atmosphere. I am not blaming DJI for that. I am blaming them for not being upfront about it and giving non sense explanations about obstacle and transparent surface.

The transparent ocean surface can screw up the VPS, but it didn't. It won't have any effect on the baro as they claimed in this email:

" And like we explained in former emails, when the aircraft was controlled to fly near the water or transparent surfaces, the aircraft's barometer would be affected and the fusion height might not be accurate. "

TRiPWiRE Posted at 5-29 14:50
Having your antenna unfolded correctly is one of the most basic fundamentals. I mean, if I was DJI, I'd be wondering what else you've chosen to not do properly when it comes to the operation of a drone.

It didn't appear to go down in very deep water. Why didn't you attempt to wade out and find it? Wouldn't that have then been a possible DJI Refresh / Care claim then (assuming you have it).

There was not life guard and there were some rocks. I didn't want to risk. I had the DJI Refresh, but why would I risk injury if I am already covered by consumers laws in Australia?

Also I think JJB went through the logs and provided some good insight. No need to "wonder".

hallmark007 Posted at 5-29 01:21
I suppose no point in me rehashing what others are saying, do I think there’s a responsibility on the user to use craft in a proper environment yes, it does ask you to do this in the manual. It’s not really up to me to say if your environment was suitable except to say environment is one of the biggest causes of crashed drones.
Is it part of your warranty I’m not so sure it is, but it’s certainly your responsibility. In your case I think is fair that dji show that it was pilot error caused by you, if they cannot and equally cannot find malfunction in your craft, then it is normal for dji to offer 30% discount, it should also be noted that what you say dji has said, has not been shown here, if this was a case of simply you could have saved craft from crashing, but for some reason we don’t yet know then maybe there is blame on either side.

DJI is not saying it's a pilot error. After all it was in Quickshot with no manual control on the remote. They have 3 claims: obstacle, transparent surface affecting barometer, inaccurate barometer because of the environment. I as the pilot did not intervene to pull the drone up when it was crashing but that's not what I am arguing with them. I am arguing the barometer should have been accurate and their algorithm should have considered VPS information instead of being " mainly barometer".

G_Sig Posted at 5-29 14:03
What Dji is simply saying is that this is pilot error and I tend to say the same.
If the sensors were not right it's our the pilots to do something as in this case was easy
but you were not paying any attention to it and did nothing to correct it. Pilot error.

What? Where did DJI say that? So you put word in their mouth and then stand by it, lol.

They have never mentioned pilot error. I would have been very particular about it if they had mentioned anything like that. I have copied some of their emails here. So if you could find anything that implies pilot error let me know.

A J Posted at 5-29 02:06
Sorry to read what happened to your drone. Below is taken from page 22 of the Mavic 2 manual regarding how to safely operate your drone and the limitations of the VPS. Transparent surfaces such as water can cause the VPS to become erratic as it can't effectively detect the surface. It is therefore advisable to keep the drone relatively high (beyond VPS range) when over water or to switch off the VPS in the app. The optical flow through the VPS had clearly become erratic due to the environment you were flying in with VPS engaged at low altitude over the water and selecting an intelligent flight mode whereby VPS is required. You should always maintain VLOS of the drone too, especially when using auto flight modes such as quick shots - had you kept your eye on the drone you could have increased the throttle which would have cancelled the quick shot and ascended the drones altitude to prevent it from crashing into the water. Some learnings here and whilst I appreciate your frustration this crash was preventable with more knowledge of the drones limitations by simply reading the manual. And note that nothing that can fly is crash proof... even NASA spacecraft's.
[view_image]

It is a learning opportunity. That's why I am posting it here. I am not here to bash DJI, maybe partially, but mainly to show that DJI drones cannot be trusted in these environments, contrary to their claims and paid reviewers.

The section you copied doesn't say the barometer will be inaccurate. If you look at the logs the VPS was fairly accurate.  I didn't spot any fluctuation in VPS measurements. But apparently the height  is measured mainly by barometer which was off by around 8 meters.

AlxFlyMore Posted at 5-29 16:12
DJI is not saying it's a pilot error. After all it was in Quickshot with no manual control on the remote. They have 3 claims: obstacle, transparent surface affecting barometer, inaccurate barometer because of the environment. I as the pilot did not intervene to pull the drone up when it was crashing but that's not what I am arguing with them. I am arguing the barometer should have been accurate and their algorithm should have considered VPS information instead of being " mainly barometer".

You always have manual control, unless you lose radio control, although you were in an automatic mode, this is not autonomous mode, it still needs an operator to start and finish it, there are no autonomous modes on your drone including RTH , they all require an operator to start or finish or both start and finish and operator always has control, except in the situation of loosing Remote Radio Control.

In Quickshot mode you have full control to start stop at all times during flight, and it’s maybe lack of experience that may have been your problem in this situation.
Regarding how well everything will work, yes you have a point here, but you have 3 manuals which cover almost everything, I think, but could be wrong .

hallmark007 Posted at 5-29 17:16
You always have manual control, unless you lose radio control, although you were in an automatic mode, this is not autonomous mode, it still needs an operator to start and finish it, there are no autonomous modes on your drone including RTH , they all require an operator to start or finish or both start and finish and operator always has control, except in the situation of loosing Remote Radio Control.

In Quickshot mode you have full control to start stop at all times during flight, and it’s maybe lack of experience that may have been your problem in this situation.

Point taken, I could intervene and save the drone but I didn't. In the video you can see I got distracted for few seconds.

But it's not a pilot error.  

The user can always intervene but but then what's the point of paying so much for all the new features that they are advertising? I could spend half and get a Mavic Pro.

By the way I lost my Mavic Pro two years ago when it was in Quickshot, but I didn't complain a bit. Because Mavic Pro didn't have sensors on the side and it crashed. Fair enough, that was the pilot error. But this time it's a different story. The barometer was wrong and VPS detected the surface correctly but DJI algorithm didn't care.

AlxFlyMore Posted at 5-29 16:26
It is a learning opportunity. That's why I am posting it here. I am not here to bash DJI, maybe partially, but mainly to show that DJI drones cannot be trusted in these environments, contrary to their claims and paid reviewers.

The section you copied doesn't say the barometer will be inaccurate. If you look at the logs the VPS was fairly accurate.  I didn't spot any fluctuation in VPS measurements. But apparently the height  is measured mainly by barometer which was off by around 8 meters.

They can be trusted - I've owned ten different DJI drones over the years, flown each one over water many times and never lost one - that isn't luck. You just need to ensure that you know the limitations of the drone and adjust your flight characteristics to suit the environment you are in whether that is indoors, flying miles away, flying in strong winds, flying near buildings/trees which cause obstructions or indeed over water.

AlxFlyMore Posted at 5-29 16:04
Fantastic analysis. Thanks for taking time to look at the log. You are pointing out an importing issue: how DJI measures the height. They haven't given me a number although I have pushed a lot. What they said is:

"... the height showing on the top of the app was the relative height according to the took-off point, it is a fusion height measured mainly via the barometer. "

If the drone was coming to you that means recording was ended and quickshot mode was about to finish.

There was no reason fo you not to look at the drone. As far as I remember the remote plays a sound so you can be aware when recording is finished.

I am sorry for not being on your side here, although we have a similar crash in common, but I really don't find it reasonable to blame the drone when you as a pilot were not paying any attention to it.

Autonomous flight systems in DJI drones are good, but far from perfect. Nowhere in the manual DJI says that you can leave it alone and not pay any attention to it.

Drones are complex equipment and you are supposed to operate them according to their manualm therefore you must always understand your envirtoment, the drone's capabilities and fly consciously.

I understand that you leave in a different country, different culture and different laws apply there but you as a pilot didn't take all the required precausions to avoid such an accident. It looks that you didn't even try to collect it because you felt that local law will protect you.

But at the moment of crash how could you be so sure that this was drone's fault? The flight log analysis from which you found out about the possible malfuntion of the barometer took place afterwards.

Bottom line for me is that you didn't pay any attention to the drone and you 've flown way to close to the sea which is clearly not recomendded as stated in the manual.

jpap Posted at 5-30 00:48
If the drone was coming to you that means recording was ended and quickshot mode was about to finish.

There was no reason fo you not to look at the drone. As far as I remember the remote plays a sound so you can be aware when recording is finished.

Well you are missing the point. The point is not that the pilot is not able to over ride. If you read previous posts you can see that we have established that. The point is that the drone's barometer has 8 meters inaccuracy. The VPS is fairly accurate but in Quickshot mode the DJI algorithm is mainly focusing on the barometer and even though VPS is saying we are crashing, the IMU drives the drone down.

So basically your $2000 turns to a $500 drone that has be to be manually controlled and you need to have your finger on the remote at all times. It doesn't matter if the Quickshot has ended or not, when barometer is inaccurate and VPS isn't stopping the drone anything can happen at any time. This time it was after Quickshot. Also note, in emails from DJI they never claimed I had to manually over ride. They blamed the environment, the transparent surface that affects barometer, and an obstacle.

The law in my country says if you advertise the product in this way:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SembcsxrQw

You should deliver it in that way. If you don't, the customer is entitled for a refund. I understand in some countries there isn't such a consumer protection. I am taking DJI reseller to ACCC and I will report back to the community if DJI acted within their obligations. I really doubt it they did.

I explained that there was no life guard and the slippery rocks posed a risk. Wouldn't I feel stupid if I had injured myself in a foreign country trying to recover the drone's body? I would. So no, not for $2000.

This ALL could have been avoided

1- Keep your aircraft in VLOS
2- Position yourself in a safe place so you DO NOT NEED TO MOVE
3- Fingers on the sticks to correct any issue that might arise,  EYES on your aircraft
4- see # 1-  If you hadn't looked down at the area you were standing, the opportunity to correct the aircraft position would have been in your hands
5- your first mistake was your position on the beach......That lead to the loss of your aircraft.

I am sorry you lost your A/C,  an unfortunate lesson
Randy

rwynant V1 Posted at 5-30 19:45
This ALL could have been avoided

1- Keep your aircraft in VLOS

Randy,

All of your points are valid for Mavic 2 and EVERY other cheap drones with no sensors at all!

If we are paying more for the features, we should be able to trust those features. Watch the official Mavic 2 video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SembcsxrQw

After highlighting the new feature of having sensors on all sides, at 3.40 it says, "the aircraft analyses every inch of its surrounding to move around obstacles without stoping so you can focus on capturing the perfect shot."

Well that's in sharp contrast with your instructions. I am not saying your instructions are not valid, in the hindsight they are, but I am saying DJI should be upfront about it.

When I shelled out $2000 and bought Mavic 2 I  thought I am buying "a virtually crash proof drone" as a Youtuber put it. Having lost one Mavic Pro two years ago, this time I thought well I pay a bit more but I am getting a drone that does not crash easily.

It's like you buy a car with all the safety features and when they fail, the manufacturer tells you "well only if you were more careful while driving". That's a valid point but not directly relevant. I didn't get what I paid for, that's the point.

Also, I have to repeat: DJI tech is not saying it's a user error and I had to over ride the automatic flying. So I am on good grounds when I take them to ACCC.

Having said all of these, I am not bashing DJI. They are still number one. But in future, I will buy cheaper models knowing that the drone can crash so it's not worth that much money. For recreational users, $500 Spark is a much better buy as it only needs to fly few meters (VLOS) and the video is good enough as DJI doesn't recommend flying at night (didn't know that either, found out after crash).

AlxFlyMore Posted at 5-30 14:21
Well you are missing the point. The point is not that the pilot is not able to over ride. If you read previous posts you can see that we have established that. The point is that the drone's barometer has 8 meters inaccuracy. The VPS is fairly accurate but in Quickshot mode the DJI algorithm is mainly focusing on the barometer and even though VPS is saying we are crashing, the IMU drives the drone down.

So basically your $2000 turns to a $500 drone that has be to be manually controlled and you need to have your finger on the remote at all times. It doesn't matter if the Quickshot has ended or not, when barometer is inaccurate and VPS isn't stopping the drone anything can happen at any time. This time it was after Quickshot. Also note, in emails from DJI they never claimed I had to manually over ride. They blamed the environment, the transparent surface that affects barometer, and an obstacle.

Dear friend, You focus on a small aspect of the whole story.

You 're saying that Mavic 2 cannot fly over water. Well it can(given the constraints and limitations mentioned in the manual). You just need to pilot it, all the time.   

I hope this will be an interesting lesson to anybody reading this thread, and thank you for sharing your story.

Again, I feel like defending DJI here, which is really awkward for me , since I felt first hand how bad their support is, but I'm saying my honest opinion on your case.

What DJI said to you, (blamed the environment etc) seems to be on par to their manual. They still put the blame one the user but indirectly, because he wasn't extra cautious when flying (or not flying) the drone. Very intersting case. If you like, keep us posted with your lawsuit results. It's interesting to see how courts think in other countries.   

*delete****

AlxFlyMore Posted at 5-30 20:53
Randy,

All of your points are valid for Mavic 2 and EVERY other cheap drones with no sensors at all!

There are clear outlines in your manual regarding obstacle avoidance , what your saying is a bit like returning your car to ford because you are not getting 60mpg as was advertised, you are an intelligent guy, surely you don’t expect people to believe you trusted 100% without reading the manual that obstacle avoidance would somehow in all scenarios protect your drone.

Remember you have already stated here that you crashed and wrote another dji drone .

It seems the drone was landing then a big wave hit it when you turned away..  I have the same amount of trust when the drone is in flight and hovering but when it's coming in to land you have to watch it unless you are hovering for sure.  That totally sucks though!  It doesn't seem to be DJI error at all.  It just was probably hard to hear the "landing" because of the waves crashing in.  It was also probably hard to see the screen indicating "landing" because of the very bright sunlight.  It's a recipe for accidents to happen.

AntDX316 Posted at 5-31 02:53
It seems the drone was landing then a big wave hit it when you turned away..  I have the same amount of trust when the drone is in flight and hovering but when it's coming in to land you have to watch it unless you are hovering for sure.  That totally sucks though!  It doesn't seem to be DJI error at all.  It just was probably hard to hear the "landing" because of the waves crashing in.  It was also probably hard to see the screen indicating "landing" because of the very bright sunlight.  It's a recipe for accidents to happen.

Mate it was not landing. It was returning to the starting point after taking a Quickshot but it dived to ocean.

AlxFlyMore Posted at 5-31 19:53
Mate it was not landing. It was returning to the starting point after taking a Quickshot but it dived to ocean.

I understand but the way it looked like on the video when you turned away as it was vertically descending.  If we try to extrapolate with the descent rate of when you turned away, it matches the drone getting hit by a big wave at the back.

No matter how advanced these drones get I never really trust the systems like that.  They are there just in case I'm not paying attention but I usually am.  When they come close to me I take the goggles/eyes off the screen and fly in 3rd person as I was doing when I first got into drones before reliable automatic hover and GPS became an affordable norm.

I haven't flown my racer fpv quad in a long time but I couldn't figure out its orientation when coming into land so I got scared, I put the fatshark goggles on and flew it in.  I had more battery but I was pretty much done lol.  The DJIs just makes it so easy to fly in comparison!  With the bigger drones, the whole field is like nothing.  Multiple fields feel like nothing too!!

These drones are really reliable but their autonomous features don't always work.  I've done numerous tests where to my standard it's a fail.  The real idea is to learn to fly it on our own.  The ultra-reliable DJI drones have RTK but those systems are well over $5k but even then probably the systems aren't too perfect either unless it's for mapping of course.

I know it truly sucks it was lost and the trust in the systems was too high for the current generation but considering you lost it on "vacation", you can get probably and Inspire 2 for free considering you would buy that instead of going on another vacation.  I think the problem w/ the bigger drones is the screen jello.  The P4P has a bit of jello, the Matrice 600 can have Massive jello.  6 batteries for 15 minutes of flying the latest camera is insane.  Some Inspires have jello.  The Mav 2s have Zero jello.  If you don't even use the Zoom function just buy the Pro.  I like my Zoom so I can see things closer as every 24mm feels like being 5x closer than where you are.

AntDX316 Posted at 5-31 20:11
I understand but the way it looked like on the video when you turned away as it was vertically descending.  If we try to extrapolate with the descent rate of when you turned away, it matches the drone getting hit by a big wave at the back.

No matter how advanced these drones get I never really trust the systems like that.  They are there just in case I'm not paying attention but I usually am.  When they come close to me I take the goggles/eyes off the screen and fly in 3rd person as I was doing when I first got into drones before reliable automatic hover and GPS became an affordable norm.

If you look at the flight data the IMU is off around 8 meters. So yes in the hindsight we should never trust the drone's automatic shot modes as they rely on the IMU measurements. But then again these modes and the sensors are the main selling points for Mavic. The reason I spent $2000 was because I thought I am getting a drone with sensors on all sides. Otherwise a $500 drone would do. So the lesson for me is that don't pay for the extra features as you are not going to trust them anyway.

hallmark007 Posted at 5-31 02:42
There are clear outlines in your manual regarding obstacle avoidance , what your saying is a bit like returning your car to ford because you are not getting 60mpg as was advertised, you are an intelligent guy, surely you don’t expect people to believe you trusted 100% without reading the manual that obstacle avoidance would somehow in all scenarios protect your drone.

Remember you have already stated here that you crashed and wrote another dji drone .

Absolutely, if you pay three times for a car that advertises fuel  efficiency as its main selling point you have the right to return it if it doesn't get anywhere close to it. That's why companies in Australia are very careful in what they advertise. See how Telstra advertises its 5G network:

"We expect customers to experience slower speeds ... in real world conditions, and we have more testing to do before we can give a range of typical speeds on Telstra 5G, but we expect 5G will be typically faster than 4G today".

They don't go around and say we are 10 times faster. Same thing applies to DJI and every other company. If you advertise something you must deliver it or you must make the exceptions very clear to customers.

Having said that I am not preempting the regulator's decision. They might find out DJI was right and an average consumer would have known that they can't rely on the automatic shot to safely return the drone to the starting point. I have already submitted a complaint against DJI reseller and will let you know the result.

I have received a very interesting response from Lydia from DJI tech support regarding why barometer was inaccurate:

"As for the height, the relative height showing on the top of the map was mainly measured by the barometer, when the aircraft flying near the water, the propellers were rotating and it would blow the water, the barometer would be affected so we said the fusion height would not be accurate when the aircraft was flying over the water."

This is amazing! So three seconds before the crash, IMU height was 34.1ft and VPS was 15.7ft. VPS was fairly accurate. So 5 meters above the water, the drone's propeller affected the ocean's water! What?? Someone needs to stop Lydia from replying to customers

AlxFlyMore Posted at 6-1 21:33
If you look at the flight data the IMU is off around 8 meters. So yes in the hindsight we should never trust the drone's automatic shot modes as they rely on the IMU measurements. But then again these modes and the sensors are the main selling points for Mavic. The reason I spent $2000 was because I thought I am getting a drone with sensors on all sides. Otherwise a $500 drone would do. So the lesson for me is that don't pay for the extra features as you are not going to trust them anyway.

I've tested the features and they aren't entirely reliable.

AlxFlyMore Posted at 6-1 21:58
I have received a very interesting response from Lydia from DJI tech support regarding why barometer was inaccurate:

"As for the height, the relative height showing on the top of the map was mainly measured by the barometer, when the aircraft flying near the water, the propellers were rotating and it would blow the water, the barometer would be affected so we said the fusion height would not be accurate when the aircraft was flying over the water."

Maybe post these responses they sound strange .
I wish you luck with your case, but I’m afraid that this is a clear case of user not being responsible and not accepting responsibility for his own lack of due diligence while flying what the manual clearly tells you is not a toy .