More and more I see a video where under normal flight conditions the GPS signal is lost and the drone flies away in an unknown direction!
And more and more I have a growing fear that this will ever happen to me!(( DJI must urgently  take some decisions in this direction, otherwise it will damage the  reputation of the company and the volume of sales! I do not know what it will be ... but I have some thoughts .. I think that the passive  security system will be an external GPS tracker that works with a  separate SIM card, through which it will be possible to find a drone if  it flies in an unknown direction! And an active  safety system can be an immediate emergency landing when the GPS signal  is lost for a certain time (for example, 20-30 seconds). These are some  of my thoughts that have the right to life ... there are more, but they  are difficult to implement ... for example, emergency shutdown of  engines and the inclusion of an external parachute)) And what does DJI company think about this issue?

If sales statistics and logged issue statistics were published, I believe you would find that the proportion of Sparks with legitimate errors will be extremely low, when compared to how many are without errors.

Lyons90 Posted at 2017-12-19 19:44
If sales statistics and logged issue statistics were published, I believe you would find that the proportion of Sparks with legitimate errors will be extremely low, when compared to how many are without errors.

Maybe you're right ... but I would not want to get into this unfortunate part ... I think, as well as you!)

keymatrix Posted at 2017-12-19 20:04
Maybe you're right ... but I would not want to get into this unfortunate part ... I think, as well as you!)

I certainly wouldn't like to be one of the few that suffer legitimate equipment failure (hardware or software). But, in saying that, DJI have dealt with a lot of the cases that I have seen the logs and outcomes for, very fairly (even if the device owner doesn't agree the outcome was correct).

I wish no person loss or damage of their drone, but people do need to be responsible for their own decisions in choosing when and where to put these little guys in the air.

There seems to be some instances of a problem in eu mode when you fly beyond the signal range and the connection is lost the rth seems to cause the drone to lose satellite lock which results in att mode and the drone tries to run home but in att it doesn't know where this is and so the drone flys away.

Instances seem to be linked to imu issues at the same moment or moments leading to signal lose.

Just my findings, I'm sure others will disagree

You can fit an external tracker there are many on the market.

Emergency landing, well if you had the option to fly your spark back over the water in Atti mode or land in the water which would you opt for?

Emergency shut down of engines well you can preform a CSC in an emergency this will shut your engines down,

Dji will lose volume of sales, since dji have built drones they have been loosing gps or gps being disabled due to compass problems and aircraft reverting to Atti mode, and yet there sales growth has grown exponentially year after year so I can’t see this happening.

Spark is dji’s cheapest drone and adding more redundancy to it will increase the price, if you are looking for aircraft with dual compass and dual IMU then you are looking at Mavic as your starter.

Most of what you see here and read about has more to do with inexperienced pilots flying ill prepared or bad environments, there are thousands of users flying with no problems . Flying drones is easy taking care of them and preparing and flying them in correct environments takes more work but will be of much benefit to all pilots.

Ummm... I'm just waiting till ur gps/compass fails then we'll see who comes crying... My gps/compass failed 3 days after purchase 3 flights... I know of people who changed their gps/compass 5 times so far... It's just a matter of time before ur gps/compass module fails my friend... I myself opened up and seen inside a gps/module fried... You need to realize it's going to happen regardless sooner or later... I see people trying to degauss gps/compasses thinking it's gonna fix it when the problem is in the design of the module... Band aiding will never fix a design issue... My friend is a military ordinance electronic engineer and he's dissecting a gps/compass to see why it's failing... Then when I do ima expose the failure...

hallmark007 Posted at 2017-12-20 11:06
You can fit an external tracker there are many on the market.

Emergency landing, well if you had the option to fly your spark back over the water in Atti mode or land in the water which would you opt for?

Agree with you 100%

Besides legitimate hardware and software failures. The flyer certainly has to be vigilant in all of the pre-flight preparation and planning.
Kind of like. If you run out of gas in your car after several visual and audio warnings. Then , asking if it is covered under the warranty......lol

I analyzed some cases of flying away ... most often this is due to a compass error and loss of the GPS signal. But the worst thing that can happen is a loss of control! If the loss of control is due to poor communication (long distance, interference, etc.), then we can not do anything! But if the loss of control occurred from the absence of the GPS signal in the ATTI mode or because of a compass error, but the connection with the drone did not break, then we still have a view from the camera + there can be visual contact! Why the developers would not add the Panic button, pressing it in emergency situations will force disabled all navigation systems, including GPS, compass and other systems, and the drone will be completely switched to manual control. By appearance from the camera there is always the opportunity to return home, and if there is also visual control, it will be generally easy! After all, the main problem is that because of compass errors and loss of GPS signal, the drone does not listen to the user's commands even if there is a connection and flies away in an unknown direction! I'm just looking for options to prevent such events!

For those who do not believe that the problem of uncontrolled flying is relevant, read this Russian forum - http://dji-club.ru/index.php/top ... gda-otzyv-i-vopros/

keymatrix Posted at 2017-12-22 17:08
I analyzed some cases of flying away ... most often this is due to a compass error and loss of the GPS signal. But the worst thing that can happen is a loss of control! If the loss of control is due to poor communication (long distance, interference, etc.), then we can not do anything! But if the loss of control occurred from the absence of the GPS signal in the ATTI mode or because of a compass error, but the connection with the drone did not break, then we still have a view from the camera + there can be visual contact! Why the developers would not add the Panic button, pressing it in emergency situations will force disabled all navigation systems, including GPS, compass and other systems, and the drone will be completely switched to manual control. By appearance from the camera there is always the opportunity to return home, and if there is also visual control, it will be generally easy! After all, the main problem is that because of compass errors and loss of GPS signal, the drone does not listen to the user's commands even if there is a connection and flies away in an unknown direction! I'm just looking for options to prevent such events!

Hi Keymatrix, I understand your concern. There are many factors that may disable the compass. Generally, when the drone enters ATTI mode, the pilot can control the drone manually. In ATTI mode, the drone can not hover or brake, please kindly note. If you encounter any uncontrolled issue, please kindly offer the flight records and data for analysis, thanks!

Also that fact that they attribute someone's crashes to a drone that was flown in Chicago to someone who's drone was flown in Louisiana lends credence to the fact that they don't know what they are doing when they evaluate a drone that is returned to them.

My first post here.
Just got a spark for christmass. On my second fly it did excatly the same thing that has been described here. It lost the gps signal and flew off. I was flying in open area with no obstacles and the sky was clear. I have the fly more combo with remote controller. The drone was approximately 100 meters away..  I lost control even though the drone was clearly on my sigth. It haeded straight away from me and then landed into the nearest forest. I had the camera signal all the time.  I am located in Finland and there is 60cm of snow around us.  Drone landed into the snow and was burried 20cm under it. If the battery would have died before I found it there would have been no way to find it. Fortunately the red light was shining through the snow and I was able to find my drone. Now I am afraid to fly it. It  doesnt help to keep the drone close sinse it has a mind of his own and can fly far away before landing. Before my first flight I updated the firmware to the drone and rc. I did all the preparations described inn the quick start guide before taking off.

Please help. I got my drone today. Had a few small flights. Then headed to the beach went along 85m then pressed RTH it turned snd started to come back then said gps signal weak. The drone then took off and went into bush land. I could see the blue arrow on find my drone but could not find it.. i am so upset.. what do i do?

Well ... and someone said that there are very few such cases ... Now this topic will be filled with posts of people who have drones and flew away in an unknown direction ... I have another, more important question - does anything do DJI company to eliminate these problems with the loss of orientation ???  Or is it ready to send new drones for each such case and nothing more?

fans66c44b62 Posted at 2017-12-25 01:32
My first post here.
Just got a spark for christmass. On my second fly it did excatly the same thing that has been described here. It lost the gps signal and flew off. I was flying in open area with no obstacles and the sky was clear. I have the fly more combo with remote controller. The drone was approximately 100 meters away..  I lost control even though the drone was clearly on my sigth. It haeded straight away from me and then landed into the nearest forest. I had the camera signal all the time.  I am located in Finland and there is 60cm of snow around us.  Drone landed into the snow and was burried 20cm under it. If the battery would have died before I found it there would have been no way to find it. Fortunately the red light was shining through the snow and I was able to find my drone. Now I am afraid to fly it. It  doesnt help to keep the drone close sinse it has a mind of his own and can fly far away before landing. Before my first flight I updated the firmware to the drone and rc. I did all the preparations described inn the quick start guide before taking off.

I am very sorry for your incident but believe that it can be explained. First of all I would recommend to open a new thread with your case and by doing so bring it to the attention of the DJI team in this forum.
If you wish so, you may also upload your flightrecord here http://www.phantomhelp.com/LogViewer/Upload/ and share the link with us. Some experienced users here might be able to provide you some explanations on what might have happened.
And in addition to the quick start guide you should also read the complete user manual thoroughly. You'll find the latest version in the download section of the DJI Spark website.

keymatrix Posted at 2017-12-25 03:49
Well ... and someone said that there are very few such cases ... Now this topic will be filled with posts of people who have drones and flew away in an unknown direction ... I have another, more important question - does anything do DJI company to eliminate these problems with the loss of orientation ???  Or is it ready to send new drones for each such case and nothing more?

They’re were very few cases but we will now see an increase in this and the main factor will be sheer amount of new users, this was also common over on Mavic forum after Christmas 2016.

fans66c44b62 Posted at 2017-12-25 01:32
My first post here.
Just got a spark for christmass. On my second fly it did excatly the same thing that has been described here. It lost the gps signal and flew off. I was flying in open area with no obstacles and the sky was clear. I have the fly more combo with remote controller. The drone was approximately 100 meters away..  I lost control even though the drone was clearly on my sigth. It haeded straight away from me and then landed into the nearest forest. I had the camera signal all the time.  I am located in Finland and there is 60cm of snow around us.  Drone landed into the snow and was burried 20cm under it. If the battery would have died before I found it there would have been no way to find it. Fortunately the red light was shining through the snow and I was able to find my drone. Now I am afraid to fly it. It  doesnt help to keep the drone close sinse it has a mind of his own and can fly far away before landing. Before my first flight I updated the firmware to the drone and rc. I did all the preparations described inn the quick start guide before taking off.

If that happens another time , use the "find my drone" function in the DJI go 4 App.
Will tell you the latest position, that the spark reportet to the RC

DJI Susan Posted at 2017-12-24 23:43
Hi Keymatrix, I understand your concern. There are many factors that may disable the compass. Generally, when the drone enters ATTI mode, the pilot can control the drone manually. In ATTI mode, the drone can not hover or brake, please kindly note. If you encounter any uncontrolled issue, please kindly offer the flight records and data for analysis, thanks!

When DJI Susan says in ATTI mode the drone will not hover or brake, does that mean it is continuously moving on it's own or at the mercy of the wind?  If it was a no wind day would the drone hover?  And what does she mean by braking?  It won't stop forward movement?  If it won't hover or brake, how do you land it?  In a controlled crash?

Rustic17, the fact of the matter is that in such a situation you lose control! You can not do anything! Even if you get a good Wi-Fi signal and a picture from the camera ...! You just stand, and your drone flies away from you in an unknown direction! And with it, and your money! DJI need to fix this somehow! I already suggested in such cases to make a Panic button, which will turn off the compass and GPS and transfer complete control to the user!

keymatrix Posted at 2017-12-25 07:53
Rustic17, the fact of the matter is that in such a situation you lose control! You can not do anything! Even if you get a good Wi-Fi signal and a picture from the camera ...! You just stand, and your drone flies away from you in an unknown direction! And with it, and your money! DJI need to fix this somehow! I already suggested in such cases to make a Panic button, which will turn off the compass and GPS and transfer complete control to the user!

That is just not true, in almost all cases I’ve seen where logs were shown and stick movements were recorded. In Atti mode the aircraft matched the controllers stick movements.
Can you show me one case where when Aircraft went into Atti mode and pilot tried to attempt to fly and Aircraft was unresponsive?

hallmark007 Posted at 2017-12-25 08:40
That is just not true, in almost all cases I’ve seen where logs were shown and stick movements were recorded. In Atti mode the aircraft matched the controllers stick movements.
Can you show me one case where when Aircraft went into Atti mode and pilot tried to attempt to fly and Aircraft was unresponsive?

Yes! You can see from 9.00 minute... If you know russian, you will understand! -   

keymatrix Posted at 2017-12-25 09:47
Yes! You can see from 9.00 minute... If you know russian, you will understand! - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lbGph7DzN_s

I think to be fair that doesn’t prove anything.

Well he was misoperating gesture so nothing he does is convincing

When he lost control, his fingers were not on the screen! Only when he saw that the drone was flying wrong, he began to try to stop it! And he pushed down both joysticks - that is, tried to lower it down and back! But he did not succeed, because the Spark became uncontrollable! You can easily find more the same videos on Youtube! We do not believe until it happens to you!

So for this discussion,  my Spark got  loss of  gps and compass error for two times.  I‘ve managed landing in atti mode, no problem. I have flown 130 km until now and spark is really reliable.
The main problem  will occur when the Spark gets compass error and is out of sight ( you loose orientation) and then, because of distance, spark will disconnect and drift away.
I have found, that in most threads about „ flyaways“ one emergency strategy  was  ignored. Spark has vision sensors for landing so if compass error occurs, push your left stick down until you
reach 5 m height. If there is a structured ground, Spark will hover there without gps.

fansfdcc5ccf Posted at 2017-12-25 11:27
So for this discussion,  my Spark got  loss of  gps and compass error for two times.  I‘ve managed landing in atti mode, no problem. I have flown 130 km until now and spark is really reliable.
The main problem  will occur when the Spark gets compass error and is out of sight ( you loose orientation) and then, because of distance, spark will disconnect and drift away.
I have found, that in most threads about „ flyaways“ one emergency strategy  was  ignored. Spark has vision sensors for landing so if compass error occurs, push your left stick down until you

Interesting observation! And how will this work if there are trees or rocks below? In addition, I want to note ... DJI must understand why there are errors and failures of the compass ... and find options for the safe return of the drone in such cases!

As I said,  a structured surface is nesessary. If you’ re not prepared to take over manual control in this case, you’ve made faults in your preflight planning.

keymatrix Posted at 2017-12-25 11:39
Interesting observation! And how will this work if there are trees or rocks below? In addition, I want to note ... DJI must understand why there are errors and failures of the compass ... and find options for the safe return of the drone in such cases!

I think flying in proper environments will cover this.

fansfdcc5ccf Posted at 2017-12-25 11:27
So for this discussion,  my Spark got  loss of  gps and compass error for two times.  I‘ve managed landing in atti mode, no problem. I have flown 130 km until now and spark is really reliable.
The main problem  will occur when the Spark gets compass error and is out of sight ( you loose orientation) and then, because of distance, spark will disconnect and drift away.
I have found, that in most threads about „ flyaways“ one emergency strategy  was  ignored. Spark has vision sensors for landing so if compass error occurs, push your left stick down until you

Thank you very much for this informative and first hand experience from the real world! We need more reports like yours that illustrate what the reality in the field is. Difficult flight situations can happen to all of us at any time. With Spark or any other device. The better we are mentally prepared and informed, the better we will be able to handle them.

Wachtberger Posted at 2017-12-25 13:14
Thank you very much for this informative and first hand experience from the real world! We need more reports like yours that illustrate what the reality in the field is. Difficult flight situations can happen to all of us at any time. With Spark or any other device. The better we are mentally prepared and informed, the better we will be able to handle them.

It seems to me that this is not enough in reality ... need technical and software solutions from the manufacturer's side! In addition, DJI must find the causes of the failures and either eliminate them, or find solutions for users who are in this situation!

keymatrix Posted at 2017-12-25 13:37
It seems to me that this is not enough in reality ... need technical and software solutions from the manufacturer's side! In addition, DJI must find the causes of the failures and either eliminate them, or find solutions for users who are in this situation!

Dji in other drones have seen the need for redundancy in their drones like when you have a problem with compass IMU they added 2 compass and 2 IMU, they have also added more expensive gps systems and in other drone six motors, but you forget that this costs money but your only prepared to pay for spark if you want extra redundancy buy a Mavic , P4Pro inspire MATRICE .

There are also serious problems with people flying in bad environments not caring to understand or read the manual, not taking proper care before flying, flying out of VLOS which is probably for most people 250 metres with spark, yet the biggest gripe on this forum is how people want and insist on flying further.
Relative to any other drone spark for reliability spark holds its own, but the one big difference with other drones is the amount of new drone flyers spark has and this is a huge factor.
You earlier showed a video of a guy who crashed his drone you said he was flying close to trees and a wall and we seen in the video he was trying to control drone with his phone in such an environment, well cmon let’s be fair has he no responsibility for what happened.

hallmark007 Posted at 2017-12-25 16:28
Dji in other drones have seen the need for redundancy in their drones like when you have a problem with compass IMU they added 2 compass and 2 IMU, they have also added more expensive gps systems and in other drone six motors, but you forget that this costs money but your only prepared to pay for spark if you want extra redundancy buy a Mavic , P4Pro inspire MATRICE .

There are also serious problems with people flying in bad environments not caring to understand or read the manual, not taking proper care before flying, flying out of VLOS which is probably for most people 250 metres with spark, yet the biggest gripe on this forum is how people want and insist on flying further.

You tie the cases of flyaway of drones to the bad guys who do not follow the instructions! I'm saying that this can happen to everyone ... including you too! The spark can lose control even when it is 2-3 meters away from you ... these are technical problems, not pilots' problems! You just refuse to believe it ... but only until the moment when such an event happens to you!

I cant upload the video as i do not have the drone. Only the app.
Is this problem then a user error if i lost GPS when it was returning home.  It then flew away lost in dense bush???? Only 3 hours old

Rustic17 Posted at 2017-12-25 07:09
When DJI Susan says in ATTI mode the drone will not hover or brake, does that mean it is continuously moving on it's own or at the mercy of the wind?  If it was a no wind day would the drone hover?  And what does she mean by braking?  It won't stop forward movement?  If it won't hover or brake, how do you land it?  In a controlled crash?

Rustic, may I know which drone do you use? The hover requires good GPS signal, it's hard to achieve this in ATTI mode, all depends on your sticks. I'd suggest to be accompanied by an experienced pilot for the first several practices.

fans66c44b62 Posted at 2017-12-25 01:32
My first post here.
Just got a spark for christmass. On my second fly it did excatly the same thing that has been described here. It lost the gps signal and flew off. I was flying in open area with no obstacles and the sky was clear. I have the fly more combo with remote controller. The drone was approximately 100 meters away..  I lost control even though the drone was clearly on my sigth. It haeded straight away from me and then landed into the nearest forest. I had the camera signal all the time.  I am located in Finland and there is 60cm of snow around us.  Drone landed into the snow and was burried 20cm under it. If the battery would have died before I found it there would have been no way to find it. Fortunately the red light was shining through the snow and I was able to find my drone. Now I am afraid to fly it. It  doesnt help to keep the drone close sinse it has a mind of his own and can fly far away before landing. Before my first flight I updated the firmware to the drone and rc. I did all the preparations described inn the quick start guide before taking off.

I'm sorry to read your post. Please contact the support and start a case: https://www.dji.com/support. Data analysis is recommended to check the exact status.

keymatrix Posted at 2017-12-25 09:47
Yes! You can see from 9.00 minute... If you know russian, you will understand! -

I'm sorry that I do not understand Russian. Just to verify, do you have the similar issue? With flight data, we can analyze and check the exact status. Thanks for your cooperation.

keymatrix Posted at 2017-12-25 17:14
You tie the cases of flyaway of drones to the bad guys who do not follow the instructions! I'm saying that this can happen to everyone ... including you too! The spark can lose control even when it is 2-3 meters away from you ... these are technical problems, not pilots' problems! You just refuse to believe it ... but only until the moment when such an event happens to you!

I think the real problem here is you are looking for something that is 100% not going to have any problems no matter how users fly them.
But what I’m saying is all dji drones fly exactly the same way and when they have problems they react the same way.

What you are doing is just calling it flyaway but you have no explanation about what’s going wrong, you are just repeating the same mantra, that dji will have to do something about this, so again I will ask you a question , what is it that cause of a “flyaway”

hallmark007 Posted at 2017-12-26 00:37
I think the real problem here is you are looking for something that is 100% not going to have any problems no matter how users fly them.
But what I’m saying is all dji drones fly exactly the same way and when they have problems they react the same way.

Great question, Hallmark007!) But do we, users, can respond to it? Engineers of DJI should understand this and find a solution! In fact, Spark - it's just a piece of plastic and iron  with chips! And everything that it does has an explanation!

keymatrix Posted at 2017-12-26 03:22
Great question, Hallmark007!) But do we, users, can respond to it? Engineers of DJI should understand this and find a solution! In fact, Spark - it's just a piece of plastic and iron  with chips! And everything that it does has an explanation!

Again your answering questions with questions, what I’m saying is they’re are no real problems with spark and flyaways, most can easily be explained, so my question and I will put it as simply as I can, which or what flyaways cannot be explained.

Is it ones loosing gps which are very small?
Is it ones with compass problems certainly are larger amount?
Is it otg which has been well documented.