I'm flying a P3P with an iPhone 6.  Purchased when they first came out.  Firmware has been updated a couple times.  

Last weekend I was flying and taking some footage of a music festival.  On my last flight, I received the Safe to Fly message and GPS lock.  Lifted off normally, things looked good, and I flew towards the festival.  I'm not sure exactly, but about 10 seconds into the flight, the drone went haywire.  I noticed it wasn't responding correctly to my input, and my friend noted something didn't look right.  

Drone was at a full tilt and not upright.  It was not responding properly to input and was caught in a long arc.  I looked down and saw some kind of error message.  Looked up and it was going down into a building.  Last thing I saw on the screen was the drone pitched sideways hitting the roof of the building.  Turns out it crashed into the roof, ejected its battery, ejected the camera, and cartwheeled off onto rocks below.  

It is completely smashed.  Landing gear bent, camera arm broken off, battery ejected and wet, all props damaged.  A couple motors don't move smoothly.  One of the arms is cracked.  Wires sticking out of the thing.  Battery chamber is cracked.  It looks like nothing is even salvageable and must be a total loss.

Luckily nobody was in the crash area and nobody was harmed.  I was shocked that the device failed after so many comfortable and secure flights.  I opened up a warranty claim with DJI.  Sounded simple on the phone- as they just said to send it in.  I haven't shipped the drone off yet.  But from reading online, I have heard horror stories about DJI customer service and warranty claims.  Does anyone have any advice to cover my butt?  It was clearly an issue with the drone.  The drone clearly had a mid-air malfunction, threw error(s), and crashed so quickly I barely had time to assess what was going on.  

I was recording at the time, but due to the battery being ejected, the footage is not on my SD card (which did stay in the device, amazingly).  I'd like to see if I can download information from the drone or recover the missing video so I can see what exactly happened.    Is there a way to do this?  It was in GPS mode (not atti) and should have been able to manage itself.  It was not far and had full reception.  No idea what happened, but I am worried they will try to get out of the warranty claim and pin me with a $1300 bill.

The video on the SD card is probably not lost but because the Phantom was powered off before recording was stopped it cannot be read. You should be able to fix that by recording a new video (couple of seconds is enough) with a Phantom 3. If its not possible with your Phantom anymore, you need to find somebody else with a Phantom where you can put in your SD card and record another video. Then your video should be OK again.

Flight data is on your phone. You can retrieve it with itunes in the apps section. If you scroll down in the iphone's app section you should find the folder with the flightdata txt files. They can be analyzed at www.healthydrones.com. There is also an explanation on how to retrieve the flightdata.

Get the "misc" folder off the SD card, your flight logs as well as any errors and improper control activity will be logged in there (at least it SHOULD be)  If the folder is not visible, just click on "folder options" and then find the checkbox that says "show hidden files and folders" then you should be able to see it...but, if the battery ejected like you said, it may not be there.

there could have been a number of things, without the log, it be a guessing game. did u try to put it in atti mode:
what was the compass reading b4 take off
how high was the p3 when it went haywire
was there anything there that could have caused compass interference?

This almost sounds like it threw a prop, or had an ESC malfunction.

Thanks.  I just pulled the FlightRecord and I am trying to assess.  How will the errors show up on healthydrones.com?  I don't see any Alerts but it shows 13 minor signal errors.  The GPS signal was fine in my previous flights, but on this one it shows as red and purple (poor and very poor).  Does this mean the GPS went haywire?  I saw an error message on my phone when it was crashing, but I do not see that error message in the log.  Is there a way to find it?  There should be a record of it somewhere.  It was red and was too large for the box, so it was scrolling.  I didn't read it as I was trying to regain control of the Phantom.  Thanks for the help!

I didn't get a chance to put it into ATTI before the crash.  I don't know the compass reading other than it said it was happy and good to go.  I was on top of a building, but I'd flown from there before and had no problems.  It was between 50 and 100 feet when it went haywire is my guess.  I'm not exactly sure.  

I have a couple of IDX files, no LOG files, some THM files, and no XCODE files on my SD card.  Would it be an IDX file?

Sorry for the loss of your DJI3.  I would send it in as is.

It would have been interesting to see what would have happened if you switched to ATTI Mode.   Bottom line it sounds like it flew out of control and no one knows why.
I do practice switching to ATTI Mode especially when maneuvering my DJI3.  Maybe it will help one day, maybe it won't, the practice is fun.

Good luck with DJI.

Thanks.  I've never been afraid to use ATTI.  In fact I trust it more than GPS, and this is why.  In the moment and with my friends talking to me, I didn't remember before it went down.  Shame.  Will have to see what DJI says.  If the Phantom 3s do indeed malfunction like this, I think DJI is going to have a very hard time getting out of liability if someone gets hurt.  Just because they say the user is responsible does not mean the user is solely responsible, especially since they pride themselves on automatic functioning and things like this not happening.  Crazy.

My mistake, the log file is located in the logs folder on the tablet...inside the dji folder on your device storage...it should be accurate if the controller and app stayed connected all the way thru the crash.

Ah, I found some information on the site.  On top of the GPS information it gave me, it also says this about the compass at 23 seconds, 10 seconds before the crash.  It being out of control for 10 seconds or so makes sense in my memory, as it happened so quickly I didn't get a chance to use ATTI.  Note the crash was at 33s.  At 22s into the flight, it says:

"Found rate of change in the compass of 25 degrees or more per 0.1 seconds.
That's about a 90 degree turn in a third of a second, which is not normal.

This can be a result of extremly strong winds, a crash into an object or a bad compass."

Would the compass malfunctioning cause the drone to have a mind of it's own?

zakiu Posted at 2015-9-4 10:40
Ah, I found some information on the site.  On top of the GPS information it gave me, it also says th ...

yes it would together with the fact that u say it lost gps signal too. being in p-gps mode, the 2 items that basically keep it steady are the compass and the gps.
i am beginning to believe the stories of people having "drone zappers" to knock them out of the sky. i know its easy to get a rf jammer but that would only mean lost signal with rc in which case p3 would fly home, but to make it go crazy and crash????? hmmmm

I don't think DJI will bend much on this one. They might offer you 20% off a new one, and that will only be after having your current written off one in their possession for 10-12 weeks. I'm sorry for what you are about to go through my friend.

Do what I had to do:  contact DJI Tech (https://djitechnology.zendesk.com/) and get an RMA.  Box up your P3, battery, and controller and send it to them - Put the RMA number all over the box.  Then, find something else to do for a while.  If you have not heard from them in 6 weeks, call their toll free number and inquire.  Then wait just a little while longer.   I am back flying - and very satisfied.
Don't waste your time trying to figure out flight data.  And remember to include a copy of your original purchase reciept when you send in your P3.

There is also a 720p copy of the video in the DJI GO app. Please share it once you locate it.

DroPro Posted at 2015-9-4 00:02
The video on the SD card is probably not lost but because the Phantom was powered off before recordi ...

There are some utilities to fix incompletely recoded videos.
http://live555.com/drones/DJI-Phantom-2-Vision+-video-fix/

I do not see it.  Tossed the card into another Phantom and started a new video.  Don't see the old one.  It's possible it wasn't recording and I'm remembering incorrectly.  Hard to say.  I will give DJI hell if it is not covered.  There's no reason for it to have crashed from the operator side, and it clearly shows a malfunction mid-air and associated behavior.  There is absolutely no reason that the drone should have done what it did.  If it were a compass failure, then the drone would know that the compass readings changed mid flight, and it should know not to use new compass readings mid-flight.  That's an insane liability.  No amount of "fly at your own risk" will save DJI from liability should their hardware not only fail, but should the failure cause an injury independent of operator behavior.

I filed for an RMA and already sent it in.

Sounds almost exactly the same as what happened to me.  Only difference was I managed to switch to ATTI and bring it back.  In my case the drone lifted off OK as usual and around 5 mins into the flight I received a compass error at which point it hard accelerated to the left.  The right stick would not respond, but I was able to gain more altitude with the left stick.  ATTI allowed control again and the compass seemingly fixed itself.

I since learned that you**MUST** do a IMU calibration after a firmware upgrade, something I was previously unaware of.  I've calibrated my IMU now and the compass is much quicker to calibrate than it was before.

Received an update, DJI did repair and is sending it back.  Turn around time was about 2 weeks.  I did not experience any kind of 2 month delay as some other members have reported.

zakiu Posted at 2015-9-3 19:07
Thanks.  I just pulled the FlightRecord and I am trying to assess.  How will the errors show up on h ...

Are there any Cell Towers in the area of the flight. How about Wi-Fi?
Sorry to hear about your crash. Luckily no one was hurt anon damage to anyone's property.

zakiu Posted at 2015-9-3 21:33
Thanks.  I've never been afraid to use ATTI.  In fact I trust it more than GPS, and this is why.  In ...

If someone is with me I tell them not to talk to me while I am flying. If someone comes up to me and starts talking I just ignore them and tune them out. Things can happen very fast and any distraction  to your concentration can be fatal.

rodger Posted at 2015-9-30 13:55
If someone is with me I tell them not to talk to me while I am flying. If someone comes up to me a ...

Exactly right,  If some one says something I just say I cannot talk now and don't take my eyes away.  Even when I am setting up getting ready to fly.  I don't want them gabbing at me  because I don't want to miss a step.

zakiu Posted at 2015-9-30 13:39
Received an update, DJI did repair and is sending it back.  Turn around time was about 2 weeks.  I d ...

Good to hear some good news today!  2 weeks not bad at all.  I wonder if it is a refurbished bird or the same one repaired.  Because if it was as bad as you described it would have to be built back up from scratch.

Sir Edward K Posted at 2015-9-30 16:07
Exactly right,  If some one says something I just say I cannot talk now and don't take my eyes awa ...

It works for me.

I hope this is a good lesson.  These consumer drones are not 100% foolproof.  Unlike military drones they do not have backup systems or safeguards from component failures, software glitches and signal loss.

Fortunately your Phantom did not fly full speed into the crowd of people at the music festival and kill someone.

Please don't fly Phantom drones over crowds of people.  They are not reliable enough to risk killing or injuring people for a "YouTube Clip."

At the festival there may have been many wireless transmitters that may have interfered with your signal.  I have had this happen only once in four years of flying.  I was near a railroad yard and someone was operating a small shuttle locomotive via remote control.  His signal made my craft go crazy.  Even though I activated failsafe the interference caused the FS to deactivate.  Drone smashed inverted onto a gravel road at 19m/s.

zakiu Posted at 2015-9-30 12:39
Received an update, DJI did repair and is sending it back.  Turn around time was about 2 weeks.  I d ...

Question -

Did they cover it?  (if not I'm sure you would have screamed but it would be nice to give them some credit for doing what seems to be the right thing)

Sir Edward K Posted at 2015-9-30 16:09
Good to hear some good news today!  2 weeks not bad at all.  I wonder if it is a refurbished bird  ...

Good deal Ed

Sir Edward K Posted at 2015-9-30 16:09
Good to hear some good news today!  2 weeks not bad at all.  I wonder if it is a refurbished bird  ...

Sounded like it was totaled to me also. It will be interesting to see what they did for him? Two weeks for so much damage is a fast turn around.

Definitely not the same unit.  That unit was completely totaled.  DJI did cover it, of course.  I would have mentioned if they hadn't.  Especially after checking the flight data and seeing it was a compass failure.  

zakiu Posted at 2015-10-3 23:35
Definitely not the same unit.  That unit was completely totaled.  DJI did cover it, of course.  I wo ...

The other thing is that the real log files of everything going on is stored on the drone itself every time you fly. DJI is the only one who can read those. All the others only read the logs on the device which are created by the app.

There is a USB port on the front of the P3 covered by a rubber plug. That is how those files are accessed. But like I said, only DJI can read them.

If they repaired/replaced it for free, I would think they saw something in the log.