Hello to everyone.

I would like to share my story with you guys from my DJI Mavic Pro.

I took my DJI Mavic pro alpine white out for a flight, everything was checked all lights green and ready to take off when I took off and reached a few meters high the drone started drifting towards the sea. I've checked my DJI go app and i had no warnings and no high wind alerts, everything seemed to be okay. The drone kept drifting towards the open sea when it reached almost  700 meters away, where there was in the wide open it gave the first warning of high wind, and then I figure out what was happening but it was too late since my battery was low and couldn't bring it back, which led my drone to land on water.

I'm very disappointed since the drone failed to detect the wind that was moving the drone away towards the sea. Sadly I could not feel the wind since it was not as strong but that might have been the case cause I was on the ground protected a bit by buildings. I Feel like if the drone detected the wind and gave the warning of high wind I would be able to react better, reduce the altitude of the drone, and turn on the sports mode to make it fly towards me and save the drone. Even so, I relied to much on the drone functions which led to not being able to understand what could have been going wrong at that moment.


I will be attaching the log video file, so you guys can check for yourself how the drone failed to detect wind as it was moved away towards the sea without my touch on the control.





I've contacted the support.

This is the answer
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
The aircraft could not detect the exact wind speed by itself, it detected the wind through its altitude. When it checked there was high wind affecting the aircraft, the warning of high wind would pop up on the app. We could not make sure the aircraft could detect the wind from the beginning, but the pilot should also check the aircraft's attitude through the attitude indicator during the flight. According to your flight record,  the aircraft tilted leftward for 15.9 degrees while there was no pilot's input at t=03:57, which indicated that the aircraft was affected by the wind and the pilot could also check that via the app.

For the warning of high wind, it did pipped up on the app at flight time 05:00. And the pilot could also check the aircraft's attitude through the attitude indicator on the app.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
So basically the drone failed to detect a high wind that it was drifting it away towards the sea for 5 whole mints.
____________________________________________________________________________________________


They offered me 15% discount to get a new drone back. ( the alpine white )  which you can see below.

Item	Quantity	Unit Price（USD）	Total Price（USD）
Mavic Intelligent Flight Battery (Alpine White)	1	89.00	89.00
Mavic Aircraft and Gimbal (Alpine White)	1	776.00	776.00

-15% off the discount.


I asked them why should I get the white one and not get the one you are offering online cheaper?
Link to the cheaper offer without discount

https://store.dji.com/product/mavic-pro-aircraft-excludes-remote-controller-and-battery-charger

Which includes
In the Box:
Aircraft Body (includes gimbal camera) x 1
Propeller Pairs x 2
Mavic - Intelligent Flight Battery x 1
Gimbal Clamp x 1
Micro SD Card (16GB) x 1
so basically if I order online the DJI Mavic pro ( not the white color since they confirmed they are exactly the same drones the only difference is the color ) I Have a better deal even without the 15% discount.

So basically in the email, they send me the charge me for the battery, and the drone separately.

While if I buy it myself online, I will get the drone, the battery included, propellers, sd cards etc, I feel they think their customers not smart enough to figure out this simple thing.

Also, i won't mentioned that this whole conversation with them through emails has taken me 2 months since I have been dealing with robotic answers from the customer service. They were sending me data copy paste and that's it. While I was asking them specific questions to understand what went wrong, and how I should have prevented it. Also really hate the people that pretend they care for you and your loss, and at the same time, they avoid answering all your questions and helping you on how to avoid similar situations or what to do in the future.

0 help at all.

Sorry for your loss.

But the video also shows that the wind was too strong for the drone to fly back to you.
Maybe you should have lowered the height of the drone instead of getting more up (can be seen on the left stick movement and the height-values) as the winds in the height are mostly more strong and difficult to fly again.

Maybe they will give you the discount on the other package too if you ask them kindly?

How to avoid in the future:
Check the weather conditions BEFORE you take off, especially the wind.
As soon as you get the feeling youre loosing control reduce the height and try to land somehwere nearby. Wait for less wind or change location and day.

xfirf_ Posted at 2018-2-28 12:23
Sorry for your loss.

But the video also shows that the wind was too strong for the drone to fly back to you.

Hi and thanks for your reply,

Problem is that my drone failed to detect the high wind until it was far away in the open sea, away from my eyesight.

About checking the wind before I fly, I did check the wind and it looked alright, I have flown before on that wind I been wrong and risky. if you check the video again you can see that there is not warning of high wind even if the drone has been drifting away from it, so the drone failed to detect that strong wind.


Thanks for your feedback, All I was hoping is that I had that high wind alert earlier since my drone was moved towards the sea since the beginning of the video. If I had that warning earlier I would be able to act as you instructed me. Again thanks and I know I might sound a little bit aggressive, but I hope this never happens to you from the button of my heart. I have been receiving very robotic answers, and I have the DJI support getting around the whole topic for far too long. I have been nice since the beginning and I found completely the opposite from their side.  I would be happy to share all the emails and the replies I just thought it would be too long and boring for someone to read. Thanks again for your reply man.

It may have lost something in the translation but, “it failed to detect the wind” as the cause for another fly away. Seriously? What are these pilots doing?

Pilot error, end of.

Wyke Posted at 2018-2-28 12:45
It may have lost something in the translation but, “it failed to detect the wind” as the cause for another fly away. Seriously? What are these pilots doing?

I'm referring to fails to detect wind early since the wind is pushing it towards the sea. I was hoping to have a high wind indication earlier since the drone was moved towards the sea right away after take off. If I had that indication I would react differently. Since I did not have the indication I panicked.

Sorry, we are not all as experienced as you.

Thanks for your reply. Was hoping you did not refer only to the issue with the drone but also the support, kinda sad can't share all the emails, but i got kinda sad with their replies since they were very robotic.

Does anyone know how the Mavic determines High Wind Velocity ?
I see the Mavic is flying side ways out to sea.  Could it be that since it is not going forward or backwards it feels no wind resistance. At 1:53 it gets the first warning and it just started to fly backwards.
If someone has an answer I would like to hear it.

GrahamG Posted at 2018-2-28 12:49
Pilot error, end of.

Pilot error is one thing,

Customer support is a different topic.

I'm sure you would be happy to know your drone is drifting away towards the sea with no high wind indications.

Thanks for your reply man.

djiuser_3rDGBDwFXihE Posted at 2018-2-28 12:52
Pilot error is one thing,

Customer support is a different topic.

If my drone is drifting away instead of maintaining its position, or forward progress is painfully slow, common sense dictates that you bring your drone back in, because it is obviously extremely windy. What makes zero sense is to see that there is no high wind warning and ignore that your drone is drifting away.
I don't get what you expect DJI to do when it's clearly a pilot error. There is no programming in the drones to come home if winds exceed a certain speed, or if forward progress is quite slow, and it's up to the pilot to make the decision to risk it and keep flying. Or, in your case, just ignore that your drone is drifting away until it's too late because you didn't see a warning. Be happy, they could have offered you zilch.

Hi, I am very sorry for your loss and feel with you! Would you mind uploading the relevant flightrecord to this site http://www.phantomhelp.com/LogViewer/Upload/ and share the link with us? You'll find it on your mobile device in a DJI subfolder named "Flightrecord". Nevertheless I have to agree with some previous posts that your video above already tells a lot about the cause of the incident. But if you are interested in a more in depth analysis I am sure some pilots here will be happy to explain to you on the basis of the flightrecord.

djiuser_iGJqCoTNTQSa Posted at 2018-2-28 13:14
If my drone is drifting away instead of maintaining its position, common sense dictates that you either counter the wind manually or (this is the more intelligent decision) bring your drone back in, because it is obviously extremely windy. What makes zero sense is to see that there is no high wind warning and ignore that your drone is drifting away.
I don't get what you expect DJI to do when it's clearly a pilot error. There is no programming in the drones to land if winds exceed a certain speed, as far as I know, and it's up to the pilot to make the decision to risk it and keep flying. Or, in your case, just ignore that your drone is drifting away until it's too late because you don't see a warning. Be happy, they could have offered you zilch.

Thanks for your reply,

The wind was not extreme, I did try to fly back manually if you checked the video you would see that.

I understand the risk of flying on that condition,  

I'm disappointed that the high wind warning did not pop up earlier.  My drone was drifting towards the sea with no high wind alert. I'm a new pilot so I panicked, I was hoping that it would detect wind if that wind was so strong that I was moving the whole drone away from me. All I'm saying is cause I'm not an experienced pilot as much as you guys. I'm saying that if I had that high wind warning I would know what to do, ( Lower altitude turn on sports mode and fly it back towards me )  That's the only thing i'm troubled with. That i don't understand how the drone determines high wind velocity, or if it determines high wind velocity only on specific highs

i do understand your point about the issue of not receiving earlier warning notification.  at first glance that sounds like a reasonable concern but without flight logs i cant make an educated guess about that. Unfortunately dji states that flying outside of advised environmental conditions parameters (like strong wind) absolves them from responsibility which is unfortunate but reasonable.
Does not answer your question about why you did not receive timeous warnings but unfortunately puts you on the back foot.
Sorry for your loss - that really sux

djiuser_3rDGBDwFXihE Posted at 2018-2-28 13:21
Thanks for your reply,

The wind was not extreme, I did try to fly back manually if you checked the video you would see that.

From the video, it doesn't look like you tried to bring the Mavic back. You didn't RTH and you didn't use sport mode. All you did was increase altitude where the winds were too strong for you to come back. It looks like you don't have a lot of experience with quadcopters, and I think that it's completely normal DJI couldn't help you on this case.
This crash is the result of many mistakes.

MiniPalourde Posted at 2018-2-28 13:35
From the video, it doesn't look like you tried to bring the Mavic back. You didn't RTH and you didn't use sport mode. All you did was increase altitude where the winds were too strong for you to come back. It looks like you don't have a lot of experience with quadcopters, and I think that it's completely normal DJI couldn't help you on this case.
This crash is the result of many mistakes.

Your claim is false. Please check the video again and read what i wrote...


Check the video at 1:47 I was turning the drone back.
Check 1:59 RTH right after I got the high wind alert was used.

my only worries is about not receiving the high wind alert earlier since the drone was drifting away.

I did not use sports mode cause I had no clue what was going on.

Thanks for your comment, I would greatly appreciate if you checked what I wrote, including also the video better.

Thanks man

But in 17 secs from take off you’re blown 30m sideways with no stick input shown on the screen. What were you looking at?

I always use this sort of website for an indication of the wind direction and rough speed at time I am flying  

https://www.windfinder.com/forecast/rethymnon

You can change this one for different locations in Greece

That way I can tell if I am going to have issues  and to fly much lower at say 30m.  

UAV Forecast might work as well to give a rough estimate of wind speed at different altitudes, you can get it as a app for phone or tablet, or use it on the PC

https://www.uavforecast.com/#/


For me you  should have responded as soon as the AC started to drift with no control input at all, 1.07 minutes into video

Wyke Posted at 2018-2-28 13:53
But in 17 secs from take off you’re blown 30m sideways with no stick input shown on the screen. What were you looking at?

I was looking at the screen. But the thing has i thought it was a drone error that was causing it to fly like that, kinda panicked.  I was just hoping to receive that high wind alert earlier, things would have been different then.

We do learn from our mistakes, my mistake was to fly in that environment and to wait for the drone to tell me there was high wind alert to act accordingly.  

Thing is that sometimes we are better protected cause we have buildings around us, and i did not feel the wind as hard.  But still i was just hoping to have a high wind alert right away since the drone was drifting.

lannes Posted at 2018-2-28 13:56
I always use this sort of website for an indication of the wind direction and rough speed at time I am flying  

https://www.windfinder.com/forecast/rethymnon

Thanks a lot, man, that is going to prove super useful and I will start using it. I kinda panicked and froze when it started drifting that's why I did not react very well. I did check the app all the time but in that moment i had no idea what to do. I'm not a professional pilot so that if that high wind alert would poped up a little bit earlier as the drone was moving away would be very helpful.

Thanks for your link, and help really appreciate it.

At 19 seconds your were flying sidewise with no stick inout from you... it also appears you took off with a less than full battery.... and has been mentioned, you were flying at high altitude where the wind is pretty aggressive. I'm sorry for the loss of your Mavic Pro, but there were a series of pilot mistakes that led to the loss of AC. Blaming DJI is really not the issue, except for you. You flew without proper weather info, took off with a depleted battery, and failed to see what was happening within the first few seconds of flight. It's a pretty sure way to lose your AC, and you did.  Learn from this, and if you replace your Mavic, don't repeat these mistakes.

I am so sorry for your loss. Even if the drone didn't detect the high wind, did you use the UAV app to see if it was okay to fly? Or whatever app you can use to tell you if its safe to fly or not. I was out on a trip last month and bought the drone for that vacay and sadly, it was raining and the wind was too strong I didn't even try flying.

arizona mavic flyer Posted at 2018-2-28 14:45
At 19 seconds your were flying sidewise with no stick inout from you... it also appears you took off with a less than full battery.... and has been mentioned, you were flying at high altitude where the wind is pretty aggressive. I'm sorry for the loss of your Mavic Pro, but there were a series of pilot mistakes that led to the loss of AC. Blaming DJI is really not the issue, except for you. You flew without proper weather info, took off with a depleted battery, and failed to see what was happening within the first few seconds of flight. It's a pretty sure way to lose your AC, and you did.  Learn from this, and if you replace your Mavic, don't repeat these mistakes.

I appreciate your feedback, but i feel like you missing the point.
I do understand my mistakes, and i hope this posts helps dji improve something, my drone was drifting towards the sea without a high wind alert so all i guessed was that i was a drone error and not wind problem.  About the battery 60% was more than enough for the use that i needed which was to check my new video settings.

I'm sure you would not be happy if your drone was drifting away because of the wind and you had no high wind alert. What if this happened to you in a place where you could not see the drone? Would your you be happy? I'm not bringing excuses I'm bringing up a point, something that could help everyone in the future.. I hope you can see that.  

Just another pilot air and there was a lot of them on this one.

Actually, I believe we do understand the point. The responsibility for the loss is 100% yours. Your drone does not do weather forecasts. There WERE several high wind alerts from your app. You were not watching your flight path. I don't know what a 'drone error' is. The only errors I can see were yours. As soon as the drone started to drift I would lower my altitude, engage sport mode, and fly back. I've been in unexpectedly high winds and that is exactly what I did. Your flight path was telling you all you needed to know. And forecasts are usually hopelessly out of date. You have to get a sense of the weather yourself. If you were surrounded by buildings, you likely would not have an accurate picture of the wind.

At the end if the day, you flew with half a battery (really a bad idea), took no note of any weather forecast, took no note of the actual winds free of obstacles, and took off without paying attention to the immediate feedback you were getting from your flight path. You sound a bit like the kid who murdered his parents and wants mercy from the court because he is an orphan.

You will have trouble convincing any rational person this was DJI's fault.

arizona mavic flyer Posted at 2018-2-28 15:09
Actually, I believe we do understand the point. The responsibility for the loss is 100% yours. Your drone does not do weather forecasts. There WERE several high wind alerts from your app. You were not watching your flight path. I don't know what a 'drone error' is. The only errors I can see were yours. As soon as the drone started to drift I would lower my altitude, engage sport mode, and fly back. I've been in unexpectedly high winds and that is exactly what I did. Your flight path was telling you all you needed to know. And forecasts are usually hopelessly out of date. You have to get a sense of the weather yourself. If you were surrounded by buildings, you likely would not have an accurate picture of the wind.

At the end if the day, you flew with half a battery (really a bad idea), took no note of any weather forecast, took no note of the actual winds free of obstacles, and took off without paying attention to the immediate feedback you were getting from your flight path. You sound a bit like the kid who murdered his parents and wants mercy from the court because he is an orphan.

To be honest you sound like a kid who his parents murdered themselves for having you in their life.
with that behavior, you going to move a long way in your life.
Cheers

P.S friendly advise,  work on your manners.

fansf77370fb Posted at 2018-2-28 15:02
Just another pilot air and there was a lot of them on this one.

i do understand there were pilots errors and i accept them. I did ask why i had no high wind alerts when my drone was drifting towards the sea. If the wind was that strong it should have high wind alert right?  
So do you have any thoughts on that?  Aren't you curious how the high wind alert works?

Thanks for the advice. Work on your flying and reasoning skills. I've done quite well in life, thanks.
You have a lot of time to study now without your Mavic. It would be a good use of your time. Sorry you lost your AC.
I have given you helpful suggestions. Won't enter a battle of wits with someone who is not armed. (I can be snarky too when provoked).

Good luck.

Dear fellow pilots, please, there is no reason for bashing here. The mistakes have been acknowledged by the OP and a very painful lesson learned. There is no need for insults or throwing further salt into the fresh wounds, thank you.

djiuser_3rDGBDwFXihE Posted at 2018-2-28 15:23
i do understand there were pilots errors and i accept them. I did ask why i had no high wind alerts when my drone was drifting towards the sea. If the wind was that strong it should have high wind alert right?  
So do you have any thoughts on that?  Aren't you curious how the high wind alert works?

High wing alerts are relative to the force required by the drone to compensate. It does not actually measure the ambient wind speed. If you notice the alerts were triggered when command input was evident. In short if you put the drone up to 30M altitude in a 20K wind, as long as you have GPS & Compass lock the drone will hover and maintain altitude and drift at 20K if no command input is applied for the drone to recognize. There was plenty of time to lower the altitude, get into sport mode and fly back. It is just inexperience, panic is you worst enemy in any crisis situation. Sorry for your loss, definitely not DJI's fault, if you get a replacement practice, practice, practice in a safe open area Rule #1..

So sorry to read your post. I managed to get your case number via the forum info. Per the case log, the flyaway was indeed caused by the wind, and I will not explain here anymore. Regarding the color issue, as the flyaway is the alpine white, therefore we offer corresponding color according to DJI's policy. I understand your situation, and have forwarded to the designated team to see whether there are any better solutions. They will contact you soon. Appreciate your patience and understanding. Also, we will keep learning and improve our customer service, would like to offer a better experience in the future.

djiuser_3rDGBDwFXihE Posted at 2018-2-28 14:14
Thanks a lot, man, that is going to prove super useful and I will start using it. I kinda panicked and froze when it started drifting that's why I did not react very well. I did check the app all the time but in that moment i had no idea what to do. I'm not a professional pilot so that if that high wind alert would poped up a little bit earlier as the drone was moving away would be very helpful.

Thanks for your link, and help really appreciate it.

Hope you have better luck with your drone next time.

One trick is only fly at the seaside when the wind is blowing in towards the shore, so if it does have problems coming back it will be on the land side of the beach.
Another good thing to get is a Trackimo 3g tracker, this will help you find it if it's lost, it is worth the extra money to safe guard the drone

DJI Susan Posted at 2018-2-28 19:23
So sorry to read your post. I managed to get your case number via the forum info. Per the case log, the flyaway was indeed caused by the wind, and I will not explain here anymore. Regarding the color issue, as the flyaway is the alpine white, therefore we offer corresponding color according to DJI's policy. I understand your situation, and have forwarded to the designated team to see whether there are any better solutions. They will contact you soon. Appreciate your patience and understanding. Also, we will keep learning and improve our customer service, would like to offer a better experience in the future.

Hello Susan,

Thanks a lot for your reply.

I receive an email from DJI, giving me the better solutions. Which is sadly no better solution they basically removed the battery that was included with the invoice from the offer and called it a better offer. I spend a 1000$ on your product, i lost my drone and i'm willing to buy it again. If i knew that you guys would be charging me around 150$ extra for just the colour of the drone i would never have gotten it.

they called the alpine white limited edition and that's why it's more expensive. I See that you call it a limited edition but your limited edition is still cheaper than the normal edition if you buy it online,


So Mavic Pro Fly More Combo (Black version costs 1299$

And Mavic pro Alpine white Fly more Combo Costs ( 1099 with the discount from original price of 1202 )

So i don't see how the higher price is justified in any way. On the opposite i should be getting a better deal getting back the white version instead of the black. I'm not that bothered with the colour i just want my drone back and at same time not be cheated by your team.

I hope you understand this issue.

Thank you

djiuser_3rDGBDwFXihE Posted at 2018-3-6 09:17
Hello Susan,

Thanks a lot for your reply.

Sorry about this. Did you receive the calls or emails from our team? As discussed above, the price of different areas and colors are different. We have offered you the best solution that we can offer. Hope for your understanding.

DJI Susan Posted at 2018-3-9 01:44
Sorry about this. Did you receive the calls or emails from our team? As discussed above, the price of different areas and colors are different. We have offered you the best solution that we can offer. Hope for your understanding.

I was said that I will receive a phone call, but I'm still waiting for it. I did receive email but from different people, all the time feels like people don't wanna take responsibility for this, and moving it to other people. I might be wrong but until now my emails have been forward to other people at least 5-6 times.

Could you please explain to me what you mean the price of different areas and colors are different?
Is that really the best solution you can offer? Cause it makes no sense removing the battery from the drone and call it a better offer.

Next time you go buy a car, the car dealer can give you the car without the wheels,  and call it a better offer in order to achieve a sale.