I was flying the Phantom 3 4K shooting video of the creek leading to the bay. I was ready to stop, lifted my thumbs off the sticks and I hit the Record image/button on the controller/phone screen  - no result. Then I realized tha the image was frozen. Thumbs off of sticks and the drone continued the last command; fly-away - heading on across the bay toward an airport 5-mile radius.
Once it reconnected, I truned it around and started it back to my location - going smooth.
Then, when it got close, I started a desent when it was only about 100 feet away, it disconnected again, I reversed the sticks to climb in reverse. It continued uncontrolled on the last command from the controller. No hover, no RTH - just continued to fly forward and decending into the ground.
I have not yet checked for damage beyond a couple of broken props.
I have never had this happen before and if this is the new-normal, it cannot be trusted and  this bird is permanently retired.
Thoughts?

Hello there LenSavage. I am sorry for the trouble this has caused and thank you for reaching out. Since this unfortunate event happened to your DJI Phantom 3 4K, I would recommend for you to contact our DJI Support Team at https://www.dji.com/support?site=brandsite&from=nav for further assistance with regards to this matter. We will do there best to help you and give out the best resolution for the said issue. Again, I am sorry and thank you.

As a P3A owner I can't say I know the 3.4K but presume they're similar.
What have you programmed it to do on "loss of signal"? It's usual to have it RTH but sounds as though yours is set to continue last command?

Yes, un nerving and would certainly be reluctant to fly it again until it's had a thorough test.

The way you've described the incident can't be correct.
The drone won't "continue the last command" when signal is lost or if you take your hands off the controller.
Perhaps your flight data will help work out what actually happened.

To get to your flight data, go 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.

And the moderator's cheerful post isn't going to help much as your drone is so old, DJI would only provide analysis if you pay.
Post the data here and someone will look at it for you.

cheddar-man Posted at 11-12 00:45
As a P3A owner I can't say I know the 3.4K but presume they're similar.
What have you programmed it to do on "loss of signal"? It's usual to have it RTH but sounds as though yours is set to continue last command?

sounds as though yours is set to continue last command?
That's not possible.
There are only three options for Loss of Signal action.
They are RTH (the default), Land or Hover.

Ahhhh SO! Me no thinki

The P3 4K is a wifi phantom, not much different than the P3S.  This OP reminds me of a video from long ago...

Fascinating flight! I wonder if those large lumps of "magnetised" metal (ships, bridge) had anything to do with the erratic behaviour affecting the compass? Something certainly did but well done getting it back.

Yes, well, we've seen this situation many times, when people calibrate the compass near ferrous metal near the water like when their trying to fly while standing on steel reinforced shipping piers.  

Labroides Posted at 11-12 01:59
The way you've described the incident can't be correct.
The drone won't "continue the last command" when signal is lost or if you take your hands off the controller.
Perhaps your flight data will help work out what actually happened.

Technology ALWAYS performs exactly as designed ... till it doesn't.
One day, you may get an unpleasant surprise from your drone, and people who are sure they know more than you will tell you 'can't be correct'.
Example: https://youtu.be/87qI0QcbPBw

LenSavage Posted at 11-12 17:32
Technology ALWAYS performs exactly as designed ... till it doesn't.
One day, you may get an unpleasant surprise from your drone, and people who are sure they know more than you will tell you 'can't be correct'.
Example:

Speaking as someone that has analysed the flight data from hundreds of incidents, what you think happened, is not what really happened.

Technology ALWAYS performs exactly as designed ... till it doesn't.
One day, you may get an unpleasant surprise from your drone, and people who are sure they know more than you will tell you 'can't be correct'.
So you can choose to believe your uninformed guess with no confirming evidence.
Or you can post flight data for analysis and possibly find out what actually happened and be able make sure it doesn't happen again.
Your choice

cheddar-man Posted at 11-12 09:36
Fascinating flight! I wonder if those large lumps of "magnetised" metal (ships, bridge) had anything to do with the erratic behaviour affecting the compass? Something certainly did but well done getting it back.

I wonder if those large lumps of "magnetised" metal (ships, bridge) had anything to do with the erratic behaviour affecting the compass?

Something certainly did but well done getting it back.

The bridge, ships etc had absolutely no effect on his flight.
People fly every day of the week in similar situations and much closer without effect.
You would have to be closer than 10 ft for it to make any difference.
Items on the ground cannot affect your drone's compass while you are in flight at normal heights.

The "something" that happened, happened at startup when his IMU initialised using data from the compass which was deflected by nearby steel.
He was lucky that the resulting yaw error was a small one, allowing some control.

Mark The Droner Posted at 11-12 11:10
Yes, well, we've seen this situation many times, when people calibrate the compass near ferrous metal near the water like when their trying to fly while standing on steel reinforced shipping piers.

we've seen this situation many times, when people calibrate the compass near ferrous metal near the water like when their trying to fly while standing on steel reinforced shipping piers.  

The problem was not calibrating the compass, which would have made no difference at all anyway.
The problem was that he didn't realise that the compass was warning of a problem with his launch spot.
Rather than unnecessarily recalibrating the compass, the correct action would have been to switch off, move away from the problem his compass warned about and start again.

"The "something" that happened, happened at startup when his IMU initialised using data from the compass which was deflected by nearby steel.
He was lucky that the resulting yaw error was a small one, allowing some control."

Have you seen the flight data then? I don't think he's posted it yet?

Your comment suggests that it was a compass error caused by interference from nearby metal so I wasn't;'t fat out.

Where's the flight log please Len?

cheddar-man Posted at 11-13 00:56
"The "something" that happened, happened at startup when his IMU initialised using data from the compass which was deflected by nearby steel.
He was lucky that the resulting yaw error was a small one, allowing some control."

Have you seen the flight data then? I don't think he's posted it yet?
Which data are you talking about?
There's no flight data to go with that video as it was from an old Phantom 2 and the incident happened 7 years ago.

Your comment suggests that it was a compass error caused by interference from nearby metal so I wasn't;'t fat out.
You were asking about a bridge and ships 100 metres from the drone.
Things that couldn't possibly have had any effect.

LenSavage Posted at 11-12 17:32
Technology ALWAYS performs exactly as designed ... till it doesn't.
One day, you may get an unpleasant surprise from your drone, and people who are sure they know more than you will tell you 'can't be correct'.
Example:

Example: .....
And what do you think that proves?
If you read what I wrote above, you'd see that there's no mystery to that incident.
It's not a case of technology failing at all.
It's a predictable case of an operator not understanding how his drone works, causing the incident.

Now .. where's your flight data?
Or don't you want to find the cause of your incident?
For someone who came here asking for help, you seem very reluctant to assist in getting help.

LenSavage Posted at 11-12 17:32
Technology ALWAYS performs exactly as designed ... till it doesn't.
One day, you may get an unpleasant surprise from your drone, and people who are sure they know more than you will tell you 'can't be correct'.
Example:

There are a lot of possible explanations with what happened in your instance, but we can only guess without a view of the flight log.  Posting the flight log only takes about a minute.  

DJI Flight Log Viewer | Phantom Help

Re the vid, if you watch it on youtube, you can read the pilot's comments texted below the vid which includes a compass calibration on site which likely caused the problem.  What likely happened is the pilot had a perfectly calibrated compass but screwed it up with the new calibration.  This was back in the old days when there was still a lot of mystery with the compass.  This pilot was not flying FPV so she had no on-screen telemetry to help - only the rear lamps and knowledge of the codes to guide her.  Also, DJI didn't include the ability to see a flight log on the Phantom 2 series, although Litchi eventually made that available for us which contributed greatly to Litchi's early popularity.  

Mark The Droner Posted at 11-13 05:59
Re the vid, if you watch it on youtube, you can read the pilot's comments texted below the vid which includes a compass calibration on site which likely caused the problem.  What likely happened is the pilot had a perfectly calibrated compass but screwed it up with the new calibration.  This was back in the old days when there was still a lot of mystery with the compass.  This pilot was not flying FPV so she had no on-screen telemetry to help - only the rear lamps and knowledge of the codes to guide her.  Also, DJI didn't include the ability to see a flight log on the Phantom 2 series, although Litchi eventually made that available for us which contributed greatly to Litchi's early popularity.

What likely happened is the pilot had a perfectly calibrated compass but screwed it up with the new calibration.
That's not likely at all.
It would be unusual for a calibration to be successful in an area of high magnetic interference.
Just lifting the drone to calibrate it probably took it far enough away for the calibration to proceed normally.
And if the drone was given an invalid calibration, it would not have been possible to fly it so far before the problem became apparent.

Why did the OP bother to post at all?
It doesn't look like he wants any help.

Labroides Posted at 11-16 19:19
Why did the OP bother to post at all?
It doesn't look like he wants any help.

You seem to assume that I am an inexperienced and unskilled newby.
I have hundreds of hours with Mavic Pro, Mavic 2 Pro, Inspire 2, Phantom 3 4K, Phantom 4, Spark and others and I am capable of smooth, gentile landings consistently.
You may have seen my work in films or TV. I've flown & shot for NBC/Universal, CBS, several film companies including Clint Eastwood's Malpaso Productions and many more. Yeah, over 4 years of skills & experience and zero crashes except from equipment failure such as battery overheat or gull attack.
Again; hoping it would reconnect, thumbs off sticks - it continued, then left stick full forward and right stick full back and it continued to descend forward to the ground. No hover, no RTH. The batteries were not low on the drone, the controller or the phone.
I KNOW that it happened as described and you believe you know it couldn't have happened but indeed it did. I was just asking if anybody had experienced this type of fly-away - not to be treated like a moron.
No - I will not upload any logs per a signed agreement / NDAs with agencies that I contract with.
You hang on to your assumption that you know-it-all absolutely and your erroneous assumption that I am an unskilled pilot or a liar,  and just walk away. I will ignore and delete anything else from you.

LenSavage Posted at 11-16 21:39
You seem to assume that I am an inexperienced and unskilled newby.
I have hundreds of hours with Mavic Pro, Mavic 2 Pro, Inspire 2, Phantom 3 4K, Phantom 4, Spark and others and I am capable of smooth, gentile landings consistently.
You may have seen my work in films or TV. I've flown & shot for NBC/Universal, CBS, several film companies including Clint Eastwood's Malpaso Productions and many more. Yeah, over 4 years of skills & experience and zero crashes except from equipment failure such as battery overheat or gull attack.

You seem to assume that I am an inexperienced and unskilled newby.
I didn't assume anything about you or say anything to suggest that I did.
You on the other hand have made several invalid assumptions about me.

I KNOW that it happened as described and you believe you know it couldn't have happened but indeed it did.

But you have no idea what caused it.
I've analysed the data from hundreds of flight incidents and found that it's not uncommon for what actually happened to be something different from what the flyer thinks happened.
Since you've suggested an explanation for the drone's behaviour that couldn't have happened as you describe, I suspect that there's another explanation.

I was just asking if anybody had experienced this type of fly-away - not to be treated like a moron.
No-one has treated you like a moron.

No - I will not upload any logs per a signed agreement / NDAs with agencies that I contract with.
Then you'll have no idea what really happened and continue with your  uninformed assumption of something that couldn't possibly have  happened.
Why ask for help with your incident if you get snarky with someone who could help and offered to?

You hang on to your assumption that you know-it-all absolutely and your erroneous assumption that I am an unskilled pilot or a liar,  and just walk away.
And you can hang on to your irrational assumption that what I suggested is wrong or that I've made assumptions about your skill level or truthfulness.
I was looking forward to solving the puzzle of what might have caused the incident you described, but I've lost interest in assisting a jerk with a bad attitude.

I will ignore and delete anything else from you.
Big deal, you've ignored everything else, so what's new?

Hey guys this kind of reminded me of a crash I experienced with the Phantom 3 Pro, however I never lost signal.  I can reply with a link to the video of the incident if anyone is interested, however the disconnecting and reconnecting part is definitely different from what I experienced with a compass error.  Briefly, I had just a handful of flights under my belt with the new drone and decided to take it to the park.  I believed I was far enough away from a series of power lines that were surrounding me and partially obstructed (from my perspective) by the trees surrounding the field I was in.  I should have been more aware, but I was a total newb when it happened.  I calibrated my compass and took off.  Immediately the drone started flying away from me, it felt like in video games when your controller is off and the your character moves on their own.  I was able to offset this and increase my altitude.  As my altitude increased the drone was easier to control and seemed more stable.  However, as I brought it down close to the take off point, it began veering to one side, skipped across the ground as it conducted it's landing sequence and flipped before coming to rest.  I don't recall losing connection, if I did, it would have flown in one direction and away from me until I reconnected.  If you calibrated at the scene is it possible someone had a device or there was a large metal object or object with radiation in your pocket (cell phone, I always put mine on airplane mode when using the P3P) that could interfere with the P3P that does not interfere with Mavic 2 Pro?  I'll admit, I am so used to flying the Mavic 2 Pro and now the Mavic 3 Cine that I forget to put my phone on Airplane mode when using the P3P.  I'll also admit it's been 2 years since I have done anything with a P3P, so forgive me if these issues have already been resolved and radiation is no longer an issue.  

Glad you didn't lose it!

This was when the drone was first released and I had no connection issues at that time, however I did notice the last time I flew it, that the app was very unstable and I did lose connection multiple times, so much I decided not to fly it anymore.  Again, if I had lost connection, my drone would have "flown away".

Last thought.  Is it possible someone else was operating a RC vehicle near by or was there any possibility of strong remote interference?  Does anyone know if it is possible that another more powerful remote on the same or similar frequency, could dominate the P3P signal and essentially issue commands to it?  

Booradley Posted at 11-17 14:05
Hey guys this kind of reminded me of a crash I experienced with the Phantom 3 Pro, however I never lost signal.  I can reply with a link to the video of the incident if anyone is interested, however the disconnecting and reconnecting part is definitely different from what I experienced with a compass error.  Briefly, I had just a handful of flights under my belt with the new drone and decided to take it to the park.  I believed I was far enough away from a series of power lines that were surrounding me and partially obstructed (from my perspective) by the trees surrounding the field I was in.  I should have been more aware, but I was a total newb when it happened.  I calibrated my compass and took off.  Immediately the drone started flying away from me, it felt like in video games when your controller is off and the your character moves on their own.  I was able to offset this and increase my altitude.  As my altitude increased the drone was easier to control and seemed more stable.  However, as I brought it down close to the take off point, it began veering to one side, skipped across the ground as it conducted it's landing sequence and flipped before coming to rest.  I don't recall losing connection, if I did, it would have flown in one direction and away from me until I reconnected.  If you calibrated at the scene is it possible someone had a device or there was a large metal object or object with radiation in your pocket (cell phone, I always put mine on airplane mode when using the P3P) that could interfere with the P3P that does not interfere with Mavic 2 Pro?  I'll admit, I am so used to flying the Mavic 2 Pro and now the Mavic 3 Cine that I forget to put my phone on Airplane mode when using the P3P.  I'll also admit it's been 2 years since I have done anything with a P3P, so forgive me if these issues have already been resolved and radiation is no longer an issue.  

Glad you didn't lose it!

What you've described is a simple yaw error incident.

If you calibrated at the scene is it possible someone had a device or there was a large metal object or object with radiation in your pocket (cell phone, I always put mine on airplane mode when using the P3P) that could interfere with the P3P that does not interfere with Mavic 2 Pro?  
No.
If you try to recalibrate your compass (completely unnecessary) in a strong magnetic field, the calibration will almost always fail.
In a weak field, it will recalibrate exactly as it was before you recalibrated.

I'll admit, I am so used to flying the Mavic 2 Pro and now the Mavic 3 Cine that I forget to put my phone on Airplane mode when using the P3P.  I'll also admit it's been 2 years since I have done anything with a P3P, so forgive me if these issues have already been resolved and radiation is no longer an issue.
You can put your phone in airplane mode, or not.
It won't make any difference, and never has.

if I had lost connection, my drone would have "flown away".
No ... losing connection will trigger the Loss of SIgnal action you have selected in your app settings.
Losing signal won't ever cause the drone to fly away.

Last thought.  Is it possible someone else was operating a RC vehicle near by or was there any possibility of strong remote interference?  Does anyone know if it is possible that another more powerful remote on the same or similar frequency, could dominate the P3P signal and essentially issue commands to it?
No ... The P3P Lightbridge uses encrypted communications and it won't be affected by that sort of thing.

LenSavage Posted at 11-16 21:39
You seem to assume that I am an inexperienced and unskilled newby.
I have hundreds of hours with Mavic Pro, Mavic 2 Pro, Inspire 2, Phantom 3 4K, Phantom 4, Spark and others and I am capable of smooth, gentile landings consistently.
You may have seen my work in films or TV. I've flown & shot for NBC/Universal, CBS, several film companies including Clint Eastwood's Malpaso Productions and many more. Yeah, over 4 years of skills & experience and zero crashes except from equipment failure such as battery overheat or gull attack.

Did you ever figure out what happen? I also have a phantom 3 advanced so I like to keep up to date. Btw love Clint Eastwood

RenegadeCowboyAZ Posted at 11-19 17:30
Did you ever figure out what happen? I also have a phantom 3 advanced so I like to keep up to date. Btw love Clint Eastwood

No, but anybody who has had a drone ignore the sticks and continue flying into the ground might just pack it away and focus on their other drones that perform as expected like I did.
This was my primary drone years ago until I purchased the Mavic Pro and the Mavic 2 Pro and other drones.
We also own a Phantom 4 (which has never misbehaved) I will likely fly again as needed.
I like the image the Phantom  produces during the 'Magic-Hour' or at night.

BTW: As a Cowboy, you may appreciate this. This is a short film concept about a horse rancher in the 1880s who's ranch is in peril, set to the music Copeland Rock Suite. I hope to get around to actually filming it one day:
https://youtu.be/X7Q-lkhXUTU

LenSavage Posted at 11-19 19:02
No, but anybody who has had a drone ignore the sticks and continue flying into the ground might just pack it away and focus on their other drones that perform as expected like I did.
This was my primary drone years ago until I purchased the Mavic Pro and the Mavic 2 Pro and other drones.
We also own a Phantom 4 (which has never misbehaved) I will likely fly again as needed.

No, but anybody who has had a drone ignore the sticks and continue flying into the ground might just pack it away and focus on their other drones that perform as expected like I did.

Most would be interested to find out what was behind the incident so they could avoid similar things in future.
The first step towards that is posting recorded flight data.
It solves all kinds of flight mysteries.