I'm just wondering: those of you who have experienced a dreaded crashing into water and been able to recover the drone, who has had it submerged the longest and still had it survive?

While doing some nice river shots in New Hampshire yesterday, my P3A clipped the underside of a covered bridge and dropped 30 or 40 feet into the Saco River. Thankfully, rivers up here are crystal clear and I was able to see it just 2 or 3 feet under the surface... However, despite only being waist deep, the current was too strong and my attempt to wade in to retrieve failed. I then drove 5 miles down the road to my hotel to get in dry clothes, then to a sports shop to get a fishing pole and some heavy sinkers, but they didn't carry fishing equipment. That resulted in an additional 4 miles to a nearby Walmart where I embarrassingly explained my delima to the sporting goods associate. To make a long story (somewhat) shorter, I wound up back at the bridge with 100 feet of anchor rope and a couple S-hooks. After a total of about 3 hours under water, I had my aircraft back. Back at my hotel room, I spent the night with a blow dryer, towels and tissues, drying it the best I could without fully taking it apart. What next? Is the battery still good? Just looking for some insight/advice. Thanks!

I think the props will be fine, if there was no damage with the contact with the bridge. The rest of it is toast.

Rice. Big ass bag of rice. Let it dry out for days .. Good luck.

Definitely put it into rice.. anything that was under water it needs covered in rice for about a week.. making sure to dry everything first with a hairdryer.. They are harder to break than wit you'd think.  I'd same problem with mine after crashing it into a river. Now everything is working perfect again.  

I had the same experience. Hovering over a stream, didn't see a small branch and ooopps my drone fel into the stream about 70 cm deep.
Jumped into the stream, pulled the battery out and tryed to swing as much as water from the drone. It was is the stream a couple of minutes.
Went home and let it dry for five days.

After five days I put the battery in the drone and everything worked tiptop.

I think I had an angel on my back !!!!!!

I have to disagree with the rice.  In my experience,  the thing that ends up killing water exposed electronics is not the water but the corrosion.  Rice speeds the corrosion process up.  I would take it apart,  keep it in a dry place and maybe use silica gel or something else to help absorb moisture.  I use isopropyl to clean any affected connectors or other items susceptible to corrosion on the board.  I steer clear of blow dryers as well, sometimes you end up blowing water/moisture into places it might not otherwise get into.   I haven't dunked my Phantom yet but I have repaired dozens of waterlogged iPhones and Tablets with probably 95% success rate.  Good luck!!

http://www.businesswire.com/news ... udy-Proves-Rice-Dry

Take this with a grain of salt as the study was commissioned by a company selling a water repair solution,  that said the explanation seems logical to me and was similar to an explanation given by a colleague of mine.

I would probably consider the battery to be toast.  Fortunately,  you fell into fresh water,  as opposed to salt water.  Let it dry for a week or so with the battery removed.  Do the same with the battery,  just in case.  After a week or so,  press the button on the battery and see if it lights up.  If it does,  plug it into the charger.  Then try it out. You have nothing to lose at this point,  because Dji will not repair it under warranty.

The battery lights up, just shows it has full charge when I know thats not possible. I was about 15 minutes into my flight when it happened. I'm also not sure I want to try plugging it in yet.

Sorry for your crash. It is not recommended to use this battery again because of the risk. If you meet any issues, you can contact our service center in North America:
Email: support.us@dji.com
Phone: +1 (818) 235 0789  
Mon-Fri 9:00 am - 5:00 pm (PST)

To shoot this aerial photo for the Wikipedia article of the Rolle Catle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolle_Castle I had to fly above the lake in strong wind (look at the flag) with my DJI F450. When I plan to fly over the water I take with me a small towel, swimming glasses to see underwater, and swimming trunks. I did not have to use them yet to search for a quad-copter, but sometimes I just swim on a hot day anyway.

Hi;
I was under the impression that if the battery was still providing power it would accelerate the corrosion.

Is this not the case or is there a mechanism that shuts down the copter in a crash?

I just crashed mine into water and am drying it out in rice, strangely the battery disengaged before it hit the water.