Hello forum world!

I recived my Mavic Pro about a week ago as I was headed out the door to China for a business trip. I frantically unboxed it and made space in my backpack, I was excited to say the least! I landed, got to the hotel and finished the unboxing and setup (including firmware update). Yes, Mavic Pro it is truly amazing to travel with. The picture is great! The controller is better than my P4 (IMO). I got some gorgeous shots in Shanghai, Zhujiajioa, Suzhou, Tongli and other places. All was well.

Fast forward one week to today - While flying over the Bund in Shanghai I was performing a backwards shot over the water leaving the new Shanghai Tower and its surronding. Everything was going great and I was just getting ready to slow down and bring her back home. Then the video cut out... and the RC lost connection. I waited patiently then impatiently for 2 minutes (A small crowd had gathered to watch me fly). But no connection. So i took off.

I did the only thing that made sense which was to run and go find it, and here is where it gets weird for me. I switched to map mode and it showed my Mavic moving left and right in place about two miles down the road from me. I got to the location of where it should have been and there was no clear site line from where it had been coming from (between a gold building and one that said citi). I looked at the map closely and realized my starting point according to the map was a few thousand feet inside the city, not the harbor from where I took off from. I spent the next 3 hours trying to project my flight path from where I really took off to find where it really would have landed but nothing. I looked at my log and compared it to the video preview on my phone and the two didnt' quiet match up right. I searched and searched and searched but as the sun rose higher and the streets got more full, my heart sunk. After walking around for 7 miles I had to call it quits. My Mavic Pro had disappered.

Called DJI Support and found out they are only open M-F... Will call again on Monday.

Now that i'm 6 hours removed from the incident and about to board a plane regret and panic is setting in. My Mavic just flew away somewhere and either crashed or landed in some random place. I'm not mad, I'm not frustrated, I'm not straight up blaming DJI for anything (although it did just disapper), just sharing my adventure and hoping for anything good out of this situation.
(Log files and videos  to follow)

Keep flying everyone!

Atif
Hey There Studios

Aha! So the DJI Go App was tweaking out. My healthydrone.com shows something else all together. So I either hit a building or it landed on the sidewalk and someone walked away with it.
http://healthydrones.com/main?share=cUUkEP

DAMN!

Sorry ! You said you switched back to P mode right ? You were on sport mode when u lost it ? On sport mode you sacrifice all smart features... ( R to home ) + did you upload or convert to China map ? I saw that on some tutorials video? ...

I got the same msg last night : Antenna weak signal too ?!

http://forum.dji.com/thread-70879-1-1.html

Mine arrived in Xi'an a day after I left so couldn't bring it to Shanghai which was a real bummer, although I wasn't that comfortable about flying it in a major city like this. Going down to the bund tonight, if I find one lying around somewhere I'll be sure to let you know.

Mine arrived in Xi'an a day after I left so couldn't bring it to Shanghai which was a real bummer, although I wasn't that comfortable about flying it in a major city like this. Going down to the bund tonight, if I find one lying around somewhere I'll be sure to let you know.

F.C Drone City  Posted at 2016-11-5 10:17
Sorry ! You said you switched back to P mode right ? You were on sport mode when u lost it ? On spor ...

RTH does work in sport mode

Mad_Angler1 Posted at 2016-11-5 06:30
RTH does work in sport mode

S-mode (Sport)： ... Aircraft cannot return to the Home Point when GPS signal is weak .. ?

Did you attach any contact info on the drone? First thing I did when I got my Phantom. Taped a tiny piece of paper with my phone number. There are some honest people in the world.

And you ahould be mad, frustrated, and blaming DJI if the device did something it was not supposed to.

RTH should work in all modes. It should just stop current flight mode and switch to RTH.

Was the home location ever set to where you took off from? did you notice before it lost communication?

F.C Drone City  Posted at 2016-11-5 18:17
Sorry ! You said you switched back to P mode right ? You were on sport mode when u lost it ? On spor ...

Hey F.C. Drone City.

I actually never switched modes at all. I was always on P mode (or so I assume...). I pressed (and slid the bar in the app) for RTH once I lost signal, thinking it would reconnect and come home.

I've seen guys on my team crash plenty of times before and the video would still record for a few seconds. This just completely cut out which lends me to think it didn't crash maybe!? Lost signal and just landed somewhere.

Danny-B- Posted at 2016-11-5 18:56
Was the home location ever set to where you took off from? did you notice before it lost communicati ...

I got an audible notification before taking off that the home point had been set. This was before loosing communication.

fans2c08930b Posted at 2016-11-5 06:59
Hey F.C. Drone City.

I actually never switched modes at all. I was always on P mode (or so I assu ...

You know you can still watch the video & see what happened . If you have IOs  go to ITunes > Apps > files sharing > click on DJI App > videocach

F.C Drone City  Posted at 2016-11-5 19:09
You know you can still watch the video & see what happened . If you have IOs  go to ITunes > Apps  ...

Yup! I watched the video on the dji app as well as downloaded it to my computer.

Just stitched it together and uploading to Youtube to share with all of you! :/

fans2c08930b Posted at 2016-11-5 19:10
Yup! I watched the video on the dji app as well as downloaded it to my computer.

Just stitched i ...

Going to take awhile to upload from China...

gkordowski Posted at 2016-11-5 18:54
RTH should work in all modes. It should just stop current flight mode and switch to RTH.

It's always worked in the past, at least on the P4

Surely 'E' should be a right turn?

Sorry for your loss

Nothing great but thought I'd share it with everyone.

F.C Drone City  Posted at 2016-11-5 11:09
You know you can still watch the video & see what happened . If you have IOs  go to ITunes > Apps  ...

Can you explain how to do this part, I have opened Itunes on my pc clicked on APPS and all it does is show me all my APPS I cant find anywhere it says file sharing, or do I do this on the Ipad that I use for flying my P4 ?

Snowwolfwarrior Posted at 2016-11-5 20:02
Can you explain how to do this part, I have opened Itunes on my pc clicked on APPS and all it does ...

look for a folder called videocache and save that to your computer.

Snowwolfwarrior Posted at 2016-11-5 20:02
Can you explain how to do this part, I have opened Itunes on my pc clicked on APPS and all it does ...

Snowwolfwarrior Posted at 2016-11-5 08:02
Can you explain how to do this part, I have opened Itunes on my pc clicked on APPS and all it does ...

Apps > screw down (left side) you will see> files sharing/apps  > select DJI APP > videocach

Hopefully it will returned to you. You DO have it marked with your contact info? Right? A QR code? Something?

That is strange. You were out in the open, over open water, I'm not sure how you could have lost GPS signal at that point and there clearly wasn't anything you could have hit unless it was a bird strike. And I don't think a bird strike would be evidenced by the video completely blanking out from a stable shot.

m326 Posted at 2016-11-5 19:33
Surely 'E' should be a right turn?

E was a left turn and then flying backwards

Zatx Posted at 2016-11-5 20:39
That is strange. You were out in the open, over open water, I'm not sure how you could have lost GPS ...

Hey Zatx,

Thats what exactly prompted me to write in the forum; seeing if I missed something. I'm usually a very conservative pilot and don't take unnecessary risk (for the sake of people around, not necessarily my drone).

Sounds like the Casey Neistat fly away

Hey There Studi Posted at 2016-11-5 19:59
Nothing great but thought I'd share it with everyone.
https://youtu.be/FQStA3yEjTU

Hi !
Sorry for your lost Mavic, its a nightmare so shortly after you received it :-(

Could in not just be a simple thing:

As you were flying backward, couldn't you have simply hit a bird (well, or another drone however unlikely that is) ?
Wouldnt that explain it all ?

When i fly my larger crafts i never had a problem, probably they are scared by their size & noise but with the small Bebop 2 that i used for travelling / backpacking it got often attacked by birds, one time brought down by a falcon.

Could this be the secret ?

Greetings,

Nils

m326 Posted at 2016-11-5 11:33
Surely 'E' should be a right turn?

It would depend if you were flying forward yes it would be right turn, however if you turned sideways to the left and aircraft was facing up river then it would be a left turn.

It looks like you were flying backwards straight into a big building. The route stops at that building. Fairly foolish flight really... interference warnings, out of line of sight, busy city, buildings too high for RTH etc..

Just had dinner in front of those buildings, went to have a look but if it had fallen to the ground it would have been found long ago and if it didn't there was plenty of places it could have fallen that it won't be found for a long time.

Yeah my guess is you hit something while flying backward at top speed causing the signal to cut and the drone destroyed. Hopefully it didn't hurt anything or anybody else.

Is this had  to do something with the Vision positioning system ?  Flying over water (moving surface )

My first concern was that I hit a building too or worse somebody could be injured. I passed the building shown in the map a few times and asked the security guard if a drone flew/landed/crashed around there and he said no. Same with the reception inside the building.

I have reported your issue.  Have you contacted dji.com/support?

I think you got some great footage and I'm sorry you lost your mavic. Let's hope dji can look into it and maybe send you a new one fingers crossed.

IS this something that would be covered under DJ Care Refresh?

Sorry for your loss.  But losing eye contact, flying backwards in a high interference area with skyscrapers sounds like a bad idea.