Hello,

Just about 2 minutes into my flight, full battery, I was flying my mini about 8-10 meters above the ocean when it suddenly started descending, the iPhone screen showed a (Tap to cancel x ) button, which didn't work even after pressing it desperately as I saw my drone crash into the water to be lost forever.

I'm a complete amateur at reading logs but apparently it changed to "AutoLanding" at one point.

I'm trying to figure out if there is more in the logs that can help me understand what happened. Did I trigger AutoLanding accidentally? How?

Anyway. Here is the log, I hope someone can help me understand what happened.   

https://www.phantomhelp.com/LogViewer/V3HQSXPBRFAGRM92CCYU/

The first thing that attracts attention in the log is that you took off with zero satellites detected. And the map shows a home point out in the water. You should never take off until the aircraft advises you that the home point has been record. Then at 2m 0.4secs, it goes into Autoland mode. Could it be that you accidentally hit autoland?

Hi, I am sorry to know about this unfortunate incident and thank you for sharing your informative insights on what happened. I would recommend for you to contact our support team to start up a ticket: ( https://www.dji.com/support?site=brandsite&from=nav ) to further investigate the cause of the crash. We have the professional team who would do their best to assists you with regards to this matter. We hope to hear from you as soon as possible for a swift resolution. Thank you.

Well, that would explain it if the drone tried to go home and home was in the ocean, but this was not the case. It autolanded far from home.

I had both my thumbs in the sticks, maybe I pressed "autoland" but I don't even know where that is. If it's inside a menu, 100% sure I didn't do it. If it's right there on the screen, then maybe, but shouldn't it be hard to do accidentally?

I'm guessing you pressed return to home to return the drone back to you but you were only 10m away. Return to home under 20m auto lands where it is. You should be able to cancel it though. Sorry for your loss...

Would you have pressed Rth or used app to signal Rth ?

I’ve never used auto land on mini, but on other drones you get message auto land craft begins to land you are given option X to cancel when you press X you should then get message “cancel auto land OK” and I think you need to press this to cancel auto land.

Reason I asked did you do Rth on app is because it’s a slide option similar to auto land .

Would the log show something like I triggering autoland or rth? because I did neither intentionally.

fans9fa92af9 Posted at 2-20 16:16
Would the log show something like I triggering autoland or rth? because I did neither intentionally.

The PH log won’t show you commanding auto land but the .dat file might , but if you didn’t then I presume it won’t show , I’m not sure what other reason except for critical battery that triggers Auto land and this didn’t show in log, so looking at log I see no reason why except for malfunction.

You had no take-off home point, no gps before 18s. the vps system was active all the time and it was dark, everything to have problems.

You were flying in an Authorization zone (blue) from an airport. (1500 m south of airport PXM center)
As you took off without having accurate GNSS coordinates, the GEO zone from DJI was not aware of the aircraft being in an Auth Zone.
Or did you unlock the blue GEO zone prior takeoff?

The aircraft went into Autolanding at T=120.4 seconds with the GEO violation 'AirportAvoidLanding'

I did unlock prior to takeoff, it wouldn’t let me take off otherwise and I did a couple of flights some minutes earlier with no issues.

Sorry for you loss, so many things went wrong, hope you can find it.
I still think DJI must implement some sort of safety checklist for new pilots.

Hello. I went through your log and to me there's no elements to say the auto-landing wasn't user initiated.

I see you didn't plan your flight according to safety standards and took off without GPS... but the landing place was not within the home-point proximity. If you didn't inadvertently trigger the auto-landing then I don't know what caused it, but most likely it was caused by the app and device you use, along probably with the way you're holding it. The auto-landing pop-up went unnoticed and proceeded to auto-land. I believe you can cancel that but I am not overly sure because it comes natural to me to manually take off and landing every time.

Are you able to recover the AC ?

InspektorGadjet Posted at 2-21 00:41
Sorry for you loss, so many things went wrong, hope you can find it.
I still think DJI must implement some sort of safety checklist for new pilots.

Checklist for new pilots sounds very reasonable to me.

Keule Posted at 2-20 19:42
You were flying in an Authorization zone (blue) from an airport. (1500 m south of airport PXM center)
As you took off without having accurate GNSS coordinates, the GEO zone from DJI was not aware of the aircraft being in an Auth Zone.
Or did you unlock the blue GEO zone prior takeoff?

True,

At the moment the GPS LatLon was recorded this warning at 22secs in flight :  
| cannot_relieve_ban | Unable to lift restrictions! |

But why did it took until 2minutes to do an AirportAvoidLanding?

Just my 2 cents ; If only 'we' always wait for a GPS lock before take-off, this MM would still be 'alive'!

Safety checklist ?  like this one....


cheersJJB

fans9fa92af9 Posted at 2-20 16:16
Would the log show something like I triggering autoland or rth? because I did neither intentionally.

Hiya,

If you want to check if you triggerd autoland or rth by yourself, this is well seen (+ much more) in FRAP.

see this > https://forum.dji.com/thread-203659-1-1.html


cheers
JJB

fans9fa92af9 Posted at 2-20 19:48
I did unlock prior to takeoff, it wouldn’t let me take off otherwise and I did a couple of flights some minutes earlier with no issues.

Well it’s true very strange it allowed take off, I have been in this situation a number of times and unlocking is all that’s needed, but without it it’s impossible to engage in flight .

Here is one I use. I print it smaller and cut the paper to make it more "notepad" size, make 5 or so copies and staple together. If the top copy gets soiled, I just tear it off. Starred items are "once per flying location", all others are once per flight. If you like it, give me a thumbs up.  :)

tdorego Posted at 2-27 13:15
Here is one I use. I print it smaller and cut the paper to make it more "notepad" size, make 5 or so copies and staple together. If the top copy gets soiled, I just tear it off. Starred items are "once per flying location", all others are once per flight. If you like it, give me a thumbs up.  

[view_image]

Why amateur goes ocean flight?
Btw Mini is very bad drone in comparision to Spark ans Air

MARTINEZX Posted at 2-27 16:24
Why amateur goes ocean flight?
Btw Mini is very bad drone in comparision to Spark ans Air

What does that have to do with the sample checklist I shared? I respect your opinion on the mini but you may be better served expressing this in the Spark or Air forum. Cheers!