hello

  

It happened on a week ago on 12.11. South Yorkshire . England.

  

I went with my drone to take footage of sunrise. I’m not very experienced, I got only LV20 so many to learn yet. However every time I fly my drone I do it very cautiously because I mainly use my drone for YT purposes and it is priceless therefore. Last Sunday everything was ok. Before I flew to take footage I tried drone there and back to check if everything is ok because I used my new mobile phone connected to remote for first time. (galaxy note 8). Apart from message “ DJI GO 4 does not support the current Display size setting and may behave unexpectedly” everything was ok. I assumed that display of Note 8 is too big for application and it is not big deal. Decided to go for my plan. I flew 120 m above and positioned drone towards the rising sun, switched on camera did some turns left and right and then I notices that drone is still climbing up. I have to say I panicked straight away, decided to land but drone didn’t react for commands and after few tries I realised that the only thing I was able to do is to rotate drone horizontally, and control camera but I had no control over high, speed or direction of fly. After a moment my mobile phone did reset and after it came back I got message that drone has low battery and started RTH, but actually for what I have seen on the screen it still was flying away instead RTH. I pressed RTH button- nothing, I rotated drone towards me but it didn’t change direction of fly too. At this point I lost connection…

  

I described it to make long story short but actually it lasted quite few minutes and I was absolutely devastated. I decided not to give up however and I got into a car and went to search it. To my surprise the only trace in my phone in DJI GO 4 app left, was last 6 minutes of flight somewhere half way between me ( and home point) and place of last signal from drone. To make long story short after two hours of searching I found drone safely landed on a field about 2,5 km from me. So happy, mainly because it didn’t do any harm to others. It landed just about 300m from houses…

  

Now, I am absolutely scared to fly again before I find out what had happen. Please anyone could help?

  

I attach files from DJI GO 4 app and files which were with footage. There are the only file I got. There is no trace of flight from Home point to the point indicated as a start in DJI GO 4 app. ( I guess disappearance of it is connected to the reset of phone?). I have got video recording from drone as well but there is nothing suspicious in there. Last footage ( I guess from landing) is corrupted though (because of low battery?) .

  

I’ll be very grateful for any help.

  

  

below links to fly records.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1kIqj5zB60ajB4xDdg1RaQYosjmXVmQ2e

https://drive.google.com/open?id=17MKeDi4zpszMo-dygNKaA9vjzkkFC5q3

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1oQhFsJN7c3DVyPqzkQ1HEmWeqbP07mXK

adams

I initially wanted to see the DAT file from the flight since it contains more information but after looking over your logs I don't think there's really a need. The short answer is that your Mavic was blown away from you by strong winds at altitude.

I flew 120 m above and positioned drone towards the rising sun, switched on camera did some turns left and right and then I notices that drone is still climbing up.

The logs show the aircraft being commanded to ascend and descend to various heights (13m, 30m, 50m) until around 3 minutes into the flight when full throttle (left stick) was applied for about two more minutes until it reached the maximum height above ground allowed by the Go app. At that point even without further stick input it was being pushed away from you by the winds out of the northwest (around 300°) that were averaging around 4 m/s near the ground and were no doubt much stronger at your aircraft's altitude. If you're sure you weren't applying throttle when it continued to ascend then you probably need to calibrate your remote control before flying again, because the log just shows the aircraft correctly responding to stick input.

I have to say I panicked straight away, decided to land but drone didn’t react for commands

It did descend when you applied negative throttle from around 5:15 until 5:45 but was still pretty high up and also continued to be pushed southeast by the strong wind.

I got message that drone has low battery and started RTH, but actually for what I have seen on the screen it still was flying away instead RTH.

Yes, low battery RTH was initiated at around 10:32, but by that point it was already a couple of kilometers away from you.

after two hours of searching I found drone safely landed on a field about 2,5 km from me

At around 14:40 -- and fortunately while you were still connected -- it started landing due to reaching the critically low battery level. The descent probably caused it to drop behind the surrounding obstacles separating you from the Mavic, which is why you lost the connection. But in any case, good work on thinking to look near its last reported location; I'm glad you were able to locate it.
  
Now, I am absolutely scared to fly again before I find out what had happen.

From what I can see there's no need to be; your Mavic appears to have done everything it was supposed to.   

I’ll be very grateful for any help.

At the risk of stating the obvious, I'd recommend flying very cautiously and always be sure to check wind speed and direction before you fly, keeping in mind that winds above the tree line can be much stronger than what they are near the ground. And if at all possible the outbound portion of your flight should be upwind, because your Mavic will use more power flying into the wind than it will going downwind. Comparing your comments to what shows up in the log I'd also recommend that you review the settings in the Go app, particularly the maximum height setting, because it looks like the Mavic was flying a bit higher than you may have realized.

Agree with DF, in those kind of wind conditions I'd recommend flying VLOS, especially knowing that the Android was giving you warnings beforehand. Make sure you double check wind speed and direction b/c that in itself can create problems. Battery will take up plenty of juice flighting heavy headwinds. To give you an example, the other day I think there was 20 mph wind conditions, my MP was going 12 mph instead of 39-40 mph. Luckily I kept it close because I knew of the heavy wind conditions. Good that you found your MP.

Thank you guys for precise answer and getting through my logs. The wind was one of my suspects and to be perfectly honest I didn’t check UAV Forecast before this particular flight because on the ground was so quiet… no even smallest gust and I was in rush to set my other cameras for sunrise… Now I know…, more haste less speed.
I keep maximum setting in DJI app just for some comfort because I am hung-up about dabble in settings when drone is somewhere up and I need go higher – rocks in Scotland taught me to have some reserve up my sleeve. As I mentioned before I am beginner and after last Sunday lesson I changed all setting for next flight according to purpose not according my liking and I’m going to set proper settings before every flight rather than having maximum settings.

One more question though.
Last link I gave in my post is for file which was with video from drone. There are GPS coordinates and my question is: what I read wrong that it shows me position somewhere east of Africa instead place I flew ?

adams

Fortunately, the drone has been found at last. As for the error message of display size, please scan the QR code from the official website and check again: http://www.dji.com/mavic/info#downloads

Fantastic breakdown of the situation. I flew my Mavic last weekend in Southeast England and recall serious gusts. It started flying away too but I kept it between 150-200’ in clear VLOS, switched to Sport mode to maximise power to the motors and flew it back manually - it averaged 8MPH when it would normally exceed 40MPH. Landed it safely in front of me and called it a day. The official stance is that the Mavic is able to handle a ‘fresh breeze’ which is wind speeds no faster than 24MPH. Note that the higher the drone climbs the faster the wind speed - at 400’ you were probably hitting wind speeds of 30-40MPH which over powered the drone and led to what has already been stated above. To be safe I generally only fly at 300-400’ AGL when wind speeds are 10MPH or less. Well done on finding the drone - you were lucky.

Top marks to DroneFlying for the spot on analysis there.  
I must admit I have often found the Mavic struggle in winds and been blown away even when there appears to be only a light breeze on the ground.  I have found flicking it into Sports Mode does help, as does hitting the automatic 'RTH' function which does increase the speed to overcome winds.

Cheers

Ian

adam s Posted at 2017-11-17 21:58
Thank you guys for precise answer and getting through my logs. The wind was one of my suspects and to be perfectly honest I didn’t check UAV Forecast before this particular flight because on the ground was so quiet… no even smallest gust and I was in rush to set my other cameras for sunrise… Now I know…, more haste less speed.
I keep maximum setting in DJI app just for some comfort because I am hung-up about dabble in settings when drone is somewhere up and I need go higher – rocks in Scotland taught me to have some reserve up my sleeve. As I mentioned before I am beginner and after last Sunday lesson I changed all setting for next flight according to purpose not according my liking and I’m going to set proper settings before every flight rather than having maximum settings.

One more question though. Last link I gave in my post is for file which was with video from drone. There are GPS coordinates and my question is: what I read wrong that it shows me position somewhere east of Africa instead place I flew ?

You mean here? Yes, that's the location you get if you transpose / switch latitude and longitude. If for, example, you're entering them in something like Google Maps you'll want to be sure to specify latitude and then longitude, in which case those same two numbers will point you here.

DJI Susan Posted at 2017-11-18 00:57
Fortunately, the drone has been found at last. As for the error message of display size, please scan the QR code from the official website and check again: http://www.dji.com/mavic/info#downloads

Hi
I did it and app seems to be scales down a bit and looks ok for me. Hopefully will nor reset and lose data again Thanks for that

DroneFlying Posted at 2017-11-18 03:53
One more question though. Last link I gave in my post is for file which was with video from drone. There are GPS coordinates and my question is: what I read wrong that it shows me position somewhere east of Africa instead place I flew ?

You mean here? Yes, that's the location you get if you transpose / switch latitude and longitude. If for, example, you're entering them in something like Google Maps you'll want to be sure to specify latitude and then longitude, in which case those same two numbers will point you here.

Thanks for that.
Thank you for your time and shearing your knowledge.
And thanks for your patience. I got my lesson. And I wish everyone who get some bad experience had the same end I had. I flew my drone today again. Joy beyond description but entirely flight according to exact plan and no mistakes this time.
adams

Was the weather foggy or misty?

Zepis Posted at 2017-11-18 11:40
Was the weather foggy or misty?

not at all... it was very clear , a bit frosty but no fog at all. On the footage from drone I recognise buildings which are more than 5 km away...  

Really sorry to read this. Good to hear u found it.

But for others who could still have their drone. (with the current state of software), always set HOME LOCATION and before flying fly 30m up so the drone can have a better vision and come back safe in case of connection error.

I'm glad you got it back. I have flown many times already but every time the application crashed, the connection is lost or the aircraft does not respond there are always a few seconds of panic.

One advise: Even you are still not very confident using it  remember to enable the setting for allowing Sports Mode in your Dji Go app. In case of sudden strong winds that make your aircraft to drift away, you can toggle the Sports mode to try to fight back or avoid the winds before it flies away.

Stolz Posted at 2017-11-19 22:56
I'm glad you got it back. I have flown many times already but every time the application crashed, the connection is lost or the aircraft does not respond there are always a few seconds of panic.

One advise: Even you are still not very confident using it  remember to enable the setting for allowing Sports Mode in your Dji Go app. In case of sudden strong winds that make your aircraft to drift away, you can toggle the Sports mode to try to fight back or avoid the winds before it flies away.

thanks for advice.