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Lost Drone to the Sea - Help Please
3311 4 2019-6-25
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solman00
lvl.1
Flight distance : 62589 ft
Indonesia
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Hi guys,


Just joined the forum in an attempt to shed some light on why my drone dropped into the sea in Bali Indonesia.


I will copy and paste my report to DJI here:


I want to log an official complaint and report regarding the loss of my DJI Mavic Air on the 18th June 2019 which resulted from a multiple system failure relating to frozen video feed / vision & ineffective Return to Home Function.


I will best describe the situation and chronology below.


1.  The night before the attempted flight I updated the app/firmware as suggested logging into the DJI Go4 application. I am unsure if this is relevant but feel it needs to be mentioned.


2.  The morning of 18th June 2019 I attempted to photograph a beach scene showing a combination of tree line, beach and ocean


2.  The conditions were excellent - very clear day, no cloud cover.


3.  Aircraft Battery was around 90 - 100%.  The aircraft and RC connected as normal and take off experienced no problems.


4.  Everything seemed to be operating as expected.


5.  Suddenly around 50% battery I experienced complete loss of video feed / vision displayed on my iPhone 8 using the DJI go 4 app.  The video has frozen unlike sometimes with signal or intereference (which I’m used to) the feed never returned.


6.  Due to height, strong sun flare in the direction of the drone and tree line I was unable to obtain a visual so I opted to immediately RTH, land, reset both RC and aircraft and try again.  


7.  However pressing RTH the aircraft didn’t seem to be responding as normal and then appeared to do the exact opposite and in fact head away from my location causing my to feel nervous.  I watched as the distance started to increase taking the drone away from my location in the direction of the open ocean. Not good.  I also received low battery warnings which added to my concern.


8.  Trying to remain calm I decided to cancel RTH and take manual control of the aircraft.  Note at this point the video feed is still frozen so I am flying the drone “blind” using only the GPS map to point the aircraft back in the direction of the beach.  Despite my best efforts to getting the drone back the beach the aircraft lost altitude and “landed”.  I immediately lost all connection and the aircraft disconnected from the RC and application.


9.  I feared the drone had “landed” in the ocean perhaps only 10m from the beach.


10.  Using “find my drone” i tracked its location on GPS.  However despite hours upon hours checking trees, bushes, beach and even snorkelling a 30m square area at the precise point of the GPS location I was not able to locate the drone.  I tried many times but I have a young family and with a high tide in fact snorkelling in this area was putting myself at risk so chose to abort the search and return home without my drone.


11.  Still 24 hours on the GPS location has not changed - I fear my drone drowned but actually I cannot confirm where the drone is.  The GPS location is not precise enough for me to find it.


I reported this to DJI and send in screenshots, flight paths (downloadable CVS file), cache photos images, GPS location screenshots which are readily available for any investigation by technical support.|



DJI have just responded:


" Upon checking the serial number of your unit, it shows that the activation date is Mar 28, 2018, and you reported that the incident occurred on Jun 18, 2019, which is out of aircraft warranty service coverage. Hence, I am afraid that free data analysis and warranty service are not supported at this stage. For customers' convenience, we have the paid data analysis service for customers at this stage, and it charges USD$ 35 each time. Please be advised that the result of data analysis will not change the solution we provided based on the warranty period"
Are DJI basically saying that i must pay 35 USD for them to determine the reason the aircraft crashed and then in any event no replacement aircraft would be issued because I am now out the warranty period? I am just not sure whether to pursue what happened. I feel its the fault of the aircraft but even if they confirm this i think they are saying it wouldn't be replaced anyway under their policy?

Seems abit of a **** situation for me and Ive noticed many people have been experiencing these problems which indicates it is a aircraft fault.  So do I challenge this or just accept its out of warranty and move on?

Any thoughts?


2019-6-25
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solman00
lvl.1
Flight distance : 62589 ft
Indonesia
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2019-6-25
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DJI Mindy
Administrator
Flight distance : 7 ft
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Hi solman00, we are so sorry for your loss, free data analysis service will not be provided after warranty expiration. But it can be provided as a paid service and the result does not affect the repair fee, that is, no matter it turns out to be a pilot error or product issue, the warranty service will not be provided, thanks for your understanding.
2019-6-26
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CD5589
lvl.1
United States
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Hi Solman, I had similiar issue outside of Warranty, curious to see if anything additional ever came of this? Is there any benefit to doing the $35 analysis?
2019-7-15
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akozc
Captain
Flight distance : 2019951 ft
Macao
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sorry for the lost , but not end of the world remember  this could happen   any of us , so take it easy

You did good job to list all the items ,which definitely  could help the "forensic analysis"  

My only few cents: ( please ignore if done already)

  • After you updated  the app,  did you re calibrate the IMU and compass?
  • After update all your setting in the apps could be reset to default and some items could  cause the drone run away too?
  • After update did you install all batteries one by one and update them as well?
  • After update did you relink the RC and updated too?
  • Before you take off did you calibrate the compass at the take off location ( and no compass error)?
  • Number of Satellite was over 14no before take off?
  • did you set up the home location before take off ?
  • if either of above question is "NO" then could be the culprit of runaway

Btw you also mentioned  strong sun glare dont know from which direction but flying against to strong sun glare could couse drone lost the orientation,




2019-7-22
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