Hello everyone,

I lost my Mavic Mini today, purchased in July 2020. I was flying as usual in the outskirts of town where there is nobody to bother me and where I don't put anyone potentialy in danger. It was a very nice afternoon. The conditions were perfect, not too cold (5°), sunny, no wind.

I decided to go a bit far away (1000m) with the drone since the signal was perfect and the conditions great. And all of the sudden, I completely lost connection.

I had 50% of battery left so I did not panick and pressed the button for automatic return on the controler but the drone never came back. I searched for the drone for hours but wasn't able to find it. And with the area being full of snow and the drone being white, I doubt I will ever be able to find it.

I have the DJI Care Refresh and I thought DJI would ship me another drone... and apparently no, you need to find the drone for that. I am a student and I can't afford to buy a new one so I don't know what are my options.

I have at home another Mavic Mini that I crashed a long time ago. I did not have the DJI Care Refresh back then so I kept the broken drone. But I assume sending this drone to DJI won't work?



This is where I lost signal. Fly logs don't work.
nb: due to Covid-19 the field and the whole park is close so I wasn't putting anyone in danger.

Thank you very much for your help.

https://imgur.com/a/tVr9ZKx

Last moments captured by the drone before I started heading back and loose connection.

What confuses me is that the drone was going in the right direction just before it disconnected. As it had still 12'31 of battery, it should have been to get back where it took off OR I should have been able to see it if it maintained that direction and didn't try to attempt landing.
There was no obstacle between the drone and me. It's just grass.

I will go back tomorow to this area to search for the drone. This is the area where I think I should be looking, assuming that the drone didn't randomly change his direction.




I'm not sure if fly logs are of any use in the case of drone getting disonnected. But I will send them to DJI to see if they can make something of them.

Boreacuteal96 Posted at 1-16 18:23
[view_image]

What confuses me is that the drone was going in the right direction just before it disconnected. As it had still 12'31 of battery, it should have been to get back where it took off OR I should have been able to see it if it maintained that direction and didn't try to attempt landing.

I'm not sure if fly logs are of any use in the case of drone getting disonnected.
Your recorded flight data may be of great help (as long as you haven't updated the app to 1.2.2).

o to: https://www.phantomhelp.com/LogViewer/Upload/
... where you'll find instructions to upload the data to that site and it will give a report
For help interpreting the data you can post a link for the report here.
Or just post the .txt file here.

Labroides Posted at 1-16 18:42
I'm not sure if fly logs are of any use in the case of drone getting disonnected.
Your recorded flight data may be of great help (as long as you haven't updated the app to 1.2.2).

I tried using the phantomhelp log tool but the website couldn't read my data.
I can't paste the log here, it's way too long. So I uploaded it on Mediafire.

https://www.mediafire.com/file/1dvu0aevzs5711a/DJIFlightRecord_2021-01-16_%255B12-30-59%255D.txt/file


Thank you very much.

And I did update to 1.2.2

https://app.airdata.com/share/XDFfec

This is a temporary location for your log file analysis. I will delete it in about a week. But you can make a free account for yourself and upload it to airdata.com. This site does not have nearly as much data as phantomhelp.com but it's better than nothing.

https://app.airdata.com/main?a=upload

What did you have set for the action upon loss of signal?  If it was set for land or hover, it would not return to home - assuming that you pressing the RTH button was not received by the Mini (likely).
Sorry for your loss.

K6CCC Posted at 1-16 19:12
What did you have set for the action upon loss of signal?  If it was set for land or hover, it would not return to home - assuming that you pressing the RTH button was not received by the Mini (likely).
Sorry for your loss.

I did not change this setting. What is the default setting? Thank you.

GaryDoug Posted at 1-16 19:10
https://app.airdata.com/share/XDFfec

This is a temporary location for your log file analysis. I will delete it in about a week. But you can make a free account for yourself and upload it to airdata.com. This site does not have nearly as much data as phantomhelp.com but it's better than nothing.

Thank you. I made an account there and uploaded my log file.

Unfortunately, it doesnt really help me since there is no data after the drone lost signal.

It seems to be dropping fast (60 ft/sec) at the end of the recorded flight for some unexplained reason, just before losing communication. I assume you searched in the last location shown in the map.

Ice on the propellors maybe?

GaryDoug Posted at 1-16 19:23
It seems to be dropping fast (60 ft/sec) at the end of the recorded flight for some unexplained reason, just before losing communication. I assume you searched in the last location shown in the map.

Ice on the propellors maybe?

I did and did not find anything. But I will double check tomorrow.

I noticed the sudden lost of altitude too. I pressed the left joystick down to lower my altitude a bit but that can't explain alone dropping from 350ft to 124ft?

It would be a relief if the drone landed/crashed somewhere near the stadium, I would have higher chances the find it.

Thank you for your help again.

It looks like the controls were sluggish which might explain any icing. Temperature was about 34F at ground level with 61% humidity. No icing here in Florida, so I am out of my element there ;-) Wind was from the west, so maybe check also to the east of the last known location. Look for an X-shaped hole in the snow ;-) good luck!

GaryDoug Posted at 1-16 19:41
It looks like the controls were sluggish which might explain any icing. Temperature was about 34F at ground level with 61% humidity. No icing here in Florida, so I am out of my element there ;-) Wind was from the west, so maybe check also to the east of the last known location. Look for an X-shaped hole in the snow ;-) good luck!

Thanks!

There is also a possibility that it is on the roof of the stadium! That one will be hard to check.

Boreacuteal96 Posted at 1-16 19:59
Thanks!

There is also a possibility that it is on the roof of the stadium! That one will be hard to check.

Well, you would have to buy another drone to fly up there and look ;-)

Hi there, we are so sorry for your loss. If the drone is still under warranty, please contact our support team www.dji.com/support to start a ticket for the data analysis, we will help to check what happened and provide the proper resolution.

If you are unable to retrieve the drone, the DJI Care Refresh will not cover it. Thanks for your kind understanding.

Boreacuteal96 Posted at 1-16 19:04
I tried using the phantomhelp log tool but the website couldn't read my data.
I can't paste the log here, it's way too long. So I uploaded it on Mediafire.

I tried using the phantomhelp log tool but the website couldn't read my data.
And I did update to 1.2.2
Unfortunately 1.2.2 brought new encryption which prevents the log viewer from reading the flight data.

Labroides Posted at 1-17 03:40
I tried using the phantomhelp log tool but the website couldn't read my data.
And I did update to 1.2.2
Unfortunately 1.2.2 brought new encryption which prevents the log viewer from reading the flight data.

It works with this website though? https://app.airdata.com/flight/1c1c4198a790e6011d239f5a682e2df3/GENERALOverview

DJI Natalia Posted at 1-16 20:10
Hi there, we are so sorry for your loss. If the drone is still under warranty, please contact our support team www.dji.com/support to start a ticket for the data analysis, we will help to check what happened and provide the proper resolution.

If you are unable to retrieve the drone, the DJI Care Refresh will not cover it. Thanks for your kind understanding.

One more question: what would a mavic mini do under the defaut settings in the case he loses connection and wasnt in RTH? Attempt landing? fly in a random direction?

Im going back to the area where i lost it and i will be there in 30m. I will keep this thread updates (with pictures) for those interested.

Good luck. I have a feeling you will find it this time if you can get access to all the possible places. It was coming down very fast (-40 mph). I was kidding about the X in the snow, but maybe not a bad thought. The major loss of altitude would probably explain the loss of communications at that distance.
The default is to do an RTH when signal is lost.

it does Hover or Land as selected in the tri-choice tab-menu.

Icing very likely, the RH was pretty high, temp pretty low.

The good thing about icing for what I've seen is that I would expect the drone to end up under a quite narrow cone from where it went done.

Boreacuteal96 Posted at 1-17 12:24
One more question: what would a mavic mini do under the defaut settings in the case he loses connection and wasnt in RTH? Attempt landing? fly in a random direction?

Im going back to the area where i lost it and i will be there in 30m. I will keep this thread updates (with pictures) for those interested.

It works with this website though?
Airdata only shows a small amount of the recorded flight data and is not very good for incident analysis.
But what it shows about your incident is that the drone was falling at approx 16 metres/sec.
It had a serious problem.
The final warning indicates this was likely due to icing of the props and it could not have flown anywhere.

It lost signal because the line of sight from the controller to drone was blocked as the drone got close to the ground, 1100 metres away.
It was not a case of the signal dropping out.

The drone is on the ground, possibly a little way to the northwest of where it was last recorded.

One more question: what would a mavic mini do under the defaut settings in the case he loses connection and wasnt in RTH? Attempt landing? fly in a random direction?
The default loss of signal action is RTH and almost no-one changes that.
But in your case, your drone could only have continued falling.

It's only about 4:30 PM in Calgary now, so he is probably still looking....

Hello everyone. Thank you again for your help and Labroides your post was really insightfull. I would have never suspected icing to be the main problem since I've flown in harsher temperatures but it seems you're right.
So I did not find the drone. I spent several hours looking but without sucess. Now, I focused researching around the South West of where it was last recorded and the stadium. I did not really go North East (I saw the message of Labroides too late, I had already left the area). I'm not sure why it would be North East of where it was last recorded since the drone was heading back home before disconnecting. I would appreciate if someone could explain.

I will probably go back there to check again next week-end (I can't go on week days, it's far from where I live). Bad news is that snow is forecasted this week. I will also give notice to the stadium officials that there might be a drone somewhere...

So I did not find it but i'm a bit more optimistic than yesterday with all what you guys said.

Some pictures for fun







This is between the stadium and where I took off. Had to trepass on some private property and I probably wasted my time searching there.



And this is the arena. No signs of a drone there.

Boreacuteal96 Posted at 1-17 16:15
Hello everyone. Thank you again for your help and Labroides your post was really insightfull. I would have never suspected icing to be the main problem since I've flown in harsher temperatures but it seems you're right.
So I did not find the drone. I spent several hours looking but without sucess. Now, I focused researching around the South West of where it was last recorded and the stadium. I did not really go North East (I saw the message of Labroides too late, I had already left the area). I'm not sure why it would be North East of where it was last recorded since the drone was heading back home before disconnecting. I would appreciate if someone could explain.

I'm not sure why it would be North East of where it was last recorded since the drone was heading back home before disconnecting. I would appreciate if someone could explain.
Sorry .. my mistake, the direction should have been SE.
But the distance would be about 6-7 metres or less from where the last position was.
Without having access to the actual data, I can't give GPS location data, but the pink sight lines I've drawn here might help to get an approximate location if you can see the roofs well enough.

Oh okay.

I went to this area and checked it with scrutiny and did not see anything I had a decent view on the roofs as well.
I will do a triple check next time.

Boreacuteal96 Posted at 1-17 16:15
Hello everyone. Thank you again for your help and Labroides your post was really insightfull. I would have never suspected icing to be the main problem since I've flown in harsher temperatures but it seems you're right.
So I did not find the drone. I spent several hours looking but without sucess. Now, I focused researching around the South West of where it was last recorded and the stadium. I did not really go North East (I saw the message of Labroides too late, I had already left the area). I'm not sure why it would be North East of where it was last recorded since the drone was heading back home before disconnecting. I would appreciate if someone could explain.

"I would have never suspected icing to be the main problem since I've flown in harsher temperatures but it seems you're right."

What? I must be invisible. See post #10 and #12 ;-)

im going to say this but i will probably be met with the registration nonsense about added weight, etc but here goes:  may i suggest you strap on one of these and make sure it is fully charged and power it on before every flight.  i have lost a drone before and after one overnight, eventually found it right under my nose.  it was an almost-new m2z and no way was i going to give up on finding it but i was shocked how easy it was to hide and not even in deep brush.  i have tested this device myself by putting the buzzer down and walking away and there is absolutely no way you can't hear this beeping unless your drone went down in a different continent.  you don't need no stinkin' gps.   and it's cheap, i have the beacon on all of my drones:  https://www.viflydrone.com/viflybeacon.html

Hi Boreaucuteal96,

Had a look at your flight too.
As said by others your Mini has dropped down, position is known by you.

Your mini went down spinning, see my chart. Look closely in the orange lines to see it spinning.If icing is the problem than i would suspect just lower lift on all 8 blades, just going down and not spinnin this hard.

If you like put a cloud link to your DAT file for this flight, its FLY055.DAT  on your mobile device as well.
In the DAT all motor parameters etc are there, mayby does help to find the reason for this loss.

Last recorded position in air at 38 meters = 50.883725, -114.098292, did not moved far from the start falling height of 107 meters, so my guess that it must be withig radius of 4 meters from last known position. But as you already searhed for it there....did you had your phone # on the mini or on the SD card?

cheers
JJB

This one should be findable... also makes me thinking one of the best investments could be some flashing beacon of sort that could keep up into the night, and that is where you locate it.

GaryDoug Posted at 1-17 19:48
"I would have never suspected icing to be the main problem since I've flown in harsher temperatures but it seems you're right."

What? I must be invisible. See post #10 and #12 ;-)

I meant before opening a thread here

The Saint Posted at 1-17 23:00
im going to say this but i will probably be met with the registration nonsense about added weight, etc but here goes:  may i suggest you strap on one of these and make sure it is fully charged and power it on before every flight.  i have lost a drone before and after one overnight, eventually found it right under my nose.  it was an almost-new m2z and no way was i going to give up on finding it but i was shocked how easy it was to hide and not even in deep brush.  i have tested this device myself by putting the buzzer down and walking away and there is absolutely no way you can't hear this beeping unless your drone went down in a different continent.  you don't need no stinkin' gps.   and it's cheap, i have the beacon on all of my drones:  https://www.viflydrone.com/viflybeacon.html

I'll keep this in mind, thank you.

JJB* Posted at 1-18 00:53
Hi Boreaucuteal96,

Had a look at your flight too.

Interesting, thank you.

Unfortunatelly, i don't have my phone # on the SD or the mini. But I will give a call today to the Stadium.

Edit: So I just called and the Stadium Office is closed indefintely due to Covid-19 :/

Did you find the Mini?

Cients Posted at 1-19 10:17
Did you find the Mini?

The area where I lost it 1H30 from where I live and since the sun sets around 4pm, I'm only able to go on week-ends.

I will do another check next Saturday.

Boreacuteal96 Posted at 1-19 11:27
The area where I lost it 1H30 from where I live and since the sun sets around 4pm, I'm only able to go on week-ends.

I will do another check next Saturday.

Wish you all the luck!
Look carefully, on the ground, but specially on top of the trees.
Keep informing.

Boreacuteal96 Posted at 1-19 11:27
The area where I lost it 1H30 from where I live and since the sun sets around 4pm, I'm only able to go on week-ends.

I will do another check next Saturday.

How hid did you have the RTH set for.
If it lost signal it will stop rotate go RTH height and then return home.
The RTH is the night your feet are H point so if it is up hill from where you are it try to go down to RTH height it will land directly below it stopped at and go down to the ground and land hopefully softly but the snow may not be recognized.
Still not recommended but lower humidity less chance of ice . Can be much colder higher off the ground.
Sounds like it went down because of ice on the blades.
Hope you find it.
Doug

Donut Posted at 1-20 22:20
How hid did you have the RTH set for.
If it lost signal it will stop rotate go RTH height and then return home.
The RTH is the night your feet are H point so if it is up hill from where you are it try to go down to RTH height it will land directly below it stopped at and go down to the ground and land hopefully softly but the snow may not be recognized.

If it lost signal it will stop rotate go RTH height and then return home.
The RTH is the night your feet are H point so if it is up hill from where you are it try to go down to RTH height it will land directly below it stopped at and go down to the ground and land hopefully softly but the snow may not be recognized.
It's hard to work out what you were trying to say, but it doesn't matter.
The land was near flat, there were no trees involved and the drone never entered RTH mode.
It came down fast and out of control.

The Saint Posted at 1-17 23:00
im going to say this but i will probably be met with the registration nonsense about added weight, etc but here goes:  may i suggest you strap on one of these and make sure it is fully charged and power it on before every flight.  i have lost a drone before and after one overnight, eventually found it right under my nose.  it was an almost-new m2z and no way was i going to give up on finding it but i was shocked how easy it was to hide and not even in deep brush.  i have tested this device myself by putting the buzzer down and walking away and there is absolutely no way you can't hear this beeping unless your drone went down in a different continent.  you don't need no stinkin' gps.   and it's cheap, i have the beacon on all of my drones:  https://www.viflydrone.com/viflybeacon.html

That is not a bad idea. I wonder how long a charge lasts in that device.

I do know that most of the very cheap strobe lights can last up to 72 hours while still flashing (I tested two), albeit at non-FAA approved levels. I am using one on each of mine now for all flights. so I can go back and search at night up to 3 days later.

GaryDoug Posted at 1-24 20:29
That is not a bad idea. I wonder how long a charge lasts in that device.

I do know that most of the very cheap strobe lights can last up to 72 hours while still flashing (I tested two), albeit at non-FAA approved levels. I am using one on each of mine now for all flights. so I can go back and search at night up to 3 days later.

website says it will beep for 30 hours so you'll probably have until the same time next day or later than night when you can start looking for the strobes.

so between this audible and the visual flashing lights and the gps coordinates, not sure how you can actually lose your drone unless it flies far far away or goes into a canyon or somewhere way too inaccessible or....into the lake.

The Saint Posted at 1-24 23:31
website says it will beep for 30 hours so you'll probably have until the same time next day or later than night when you can start looking for the strobes.

so between this audible and the visual flashing lights and the gps coordinates, not sure how you can actually lose your drone unless it flies far far away or goes into a canyon or somewhere way too inaccessible or....into the lake.

Sure, but be aware that the lights and audible sounds from the drone will only last about 3 hours. That is why I recommend the added strobe, but only the lower-powered longer-lasting ones.