Earlier this morning around 2 am i was flying my drone (dji mavic pro) near big lake alaska. I took off and flew out about 30 ft and my drone went into atti mode and dove right into the water. Currently the drone is at the bottom of the lake and there is no way for me to retrieve it unless i rent scuba gear. I have owned this drone for over a year and it has never done this before. I did not turn on atti mode, the drone simply did it itself and it just fell right nose dived right into the water. I understand what atti mode is, its supposed to maintain altitude when when under certain conditions. Well ironically it did not hold position and instead decided it would take a swim. Its not right that this drone has a built in "safety" feature that ends up killing the drone by sending it veering into the ground. Luckily i my drone was recording and you can hear the drone say "atti mode" and dive right into the water. If it wasnt for the recording i would not have recalled it saying that.

Hi, there. On behalf of DJI, I extend my sincere apologies for the incident that you have experienced. We can only process warranty service as well as data analysis if the unit will fall within the warranty period, Therefore, Once you are out of the warranty period, we can no longer provide warranty or data analysis. We hope you understand and again we are sorry for the inconvenience caused. Thank you.

Sorry to know that

DJI Gamora Posted at 6-29 15:29
Hi, there. On behalf of DJI, I extend my sincere apologies for the incident that you have experienced. We can only process warranty service as well as data analysis if the unit will fall within the warranty period, Therefore, Once you are out of the warranty period, we can no longer provide warranty or data analysis. We hope you understand and again we are sorry for the inconvenience caused. Thank you.

Ya i must say it is pretty ridiculous such a mode is installed on a smart drone. Didn't expect my drone to barrel out of the sky because of software that DJI installed on it. I mean way to protect the 1000 dollars i spent on the drone and the great way to lose footage that i captured. Pretty ridiculous. Great pathetic atti mode.

Hi Leo,

sorry for your loss.

If you like upload your flightlog using this link > https://www.phantomhelp.com/LogViewer/Upload/

Mayby the log explains wat really happend.

cheers
JJB

wrong entry

907leo Posted at 7-8 21:35
Ya i must say it is pretty ridiculous such a mode is installed on a smart drone. Didn't expect my drone to barrel out of the sky because of software that DJI installed on it. I mean way to protect the 1000 dollars i spent on the drone and the great way to lose footage that i captured. Pretty ridiculous. Great pathetic atti mode.

from the manual

vision

Did you take of from a concrete pier or any surface containing concrete/metal? Or close to any metal?
That can throw off the compass resulting in ATTI and very erratic behaviour.
This is very different to the ATTI mode you can set manual e.g. on the Phantom 4.
There it will just drift in the wind while in Atti.

Ridg Posted at 7-9 03:01
from the manual[view_image]

[view_image]

I live in The Netherlands and fly alot above water!  If the GPS andr Compass are functioning normally no problem what so ever to fly above water, even at low altitude.

If ATTI happens flying directly away 30 feet away from home point i guess the OP did not perform the after takeoff checks.  Just hover, wait, turn left and back, wait, turn right and back  etc etc.
After that check the red compass arrow and check if it pointing same direction as the craft.
takes 1 minute and if any compass problem will pop up....just land the craft.

After takeoff checks - Drone saver!

cheers
JJB

How tall were you? The problem maybe occured when switched to ATTI for any reason, it analyze that the water was a solid surface, and tried to landed the drone. Sorry for that.

JJB* Posted at 7-9 06:04
I live in The Netherlands and fly alot above water!  If the GPS andr Compass are functioning normally no problem what so ever to fly above water, even at low altitude.

If ATTI happens flying directly away 30 feet away from home point i guess the OP did not perform the after takeoff checks.  Just hover, wait, turn left and back, wait, turn right and back  etc etc.

I think the if in this case is the GPS and compass, which as you say falls under pre-flight checks and takeoff checks.

Ridg Posted at 7-9 03:01
from the manual[view_image]

[view_image]

Take note of "and" with "either".
"when the Vision Systems are unavailable and either the GPS signal is weak or the the compass is experiencing interference."

By DJI's wording, Vision System alone being unavailable (or adversely effected) should not cause drone to go into ATTI mode.  

JJB* Posted at 7-9 06:04
I live in The Netherlands and fly alot above water!  If the GPS andr Compass are functioning normally no problem what so ever to fly above water, even at low altitude.

If ATTI happens flying directly away 30 feet away from home point i guess the OP did not perform the after takeoff checks.  Just hover, wait, turn left and back, wait, turn right and back  etc etc.

As described by OP, I doubt Compass was cause.  "drone went into atti mode and dove right into the water".  Drone should be able to hold itself at current altitude even with compass having problems.  Perhaps there were strong winds?

Based on description, it is more likely GPS signal was weak and Vision system got fooled by water.

DJI log file from device running GO-4 should narrow down cause.

907leo Posted at 7-8 21:35
Ya i must say it is pretty ridiculous such a mode is installed on a smart drone. Didn't expect my drone to barrel out of the sky because of software that DJI installed on it. I mean way to protect the 1000 dollars i spent on the drone and the great way to lose footage that i captured. Pretty ridiculous. Great pathetic atti mode.

Thank you for the additional information and we do apologize for the inconvenience. Whenever the drone enters the ATTI mode, the drone will not have GPS to lock it in its current position and may cause the drone to become unstable especially when flying above water where wind could be strong. The drone may drift with the air and back-up Vision Sensors to help the drone become stable while on flight will not work efficiently since it is above a reflective surface. Thank you for your kind and understanding.

How far north were you in Alaska? Could be that there is not enough SATs?

Everything you say is just speculation until you post your log, flying at 2am its most likely you didn’t see anything.
Post the log it should clear things up .

ATTI mode doesn't affect altitude. Period.

Posts like yours are pretty common on here, but once the facts are known, it's usually the case that the drone was functioning correctly. If you really believe your loss was due to a problem with the drone itself and want us to believe it too, then post the log by extracting it from your mobile device, uploading it here, and then include a link to it in this thread. You should also be sure to post the video you mentioned as well.

DJI will similarly (and understandably) be skeptical and will ask you for the same information if what you're really wanting is for them to provide you with a warranty replacement.

hallmark007 Posted at 7-14 12:22
Everything you say is just speculation until you post your log, flying at 2am its most likely you didn’t see anything.
Post the log it should clear things up .

Depending on where he is in Alaska, it's quite possible that he was flying in daylight despite it being 2:00 AM.

Gimpy Posted at 7-15 02:43
Depending on where he is in Alaska, it's quite possible that he was flying in daylight despite it being 2:00 AM.

That’s quite possible, I’m here in Sweden at the moment, it starts getting bright at 2.30 AM .

If anyone is every curious about the footage. Checkout my instagram https://www.instagram.com/theofficialhickel/

And as for everyone's curiosity. I was flying 30 feet away from me at 2 in the morning and there was still daylight as you will see in the video if you choose to watch it. It is the first video on my account.

907leo Posted at 7-28 15:17
And as for everyone's curiosity. I was flying 30 feet away from me at 2 in the morning and there was still daylight as you will see in the video if you choose to watch it. It is the first video on my account.

Why not post the logs?

It looked like a really nice shot too - with an amazing skyline. Sadly it looks like you had no chance to slam on the vertical climb before it tipped into the drink. Height is your friend if ATTI mode kicks in - it gives you time to recover control - potentially. The thing about ATTI mode is the drone has lost GPS locking so doesn't know where is is in 3d space. This usually is evident as a drift in the horizontal plane, but actually is also true in the vertical plane too. That is why height is your friend in these situations - it keeps your drone above most ground obstacles like trees etc.

I think if you post the logs...someone will be able to tell what exactly what went wrong, and when.

Lamplighter55 Posted at 8-2 11:47
It looked like a really nice shot too - with an amazing skyline. Sadly it looks like you had no chance to slam on the vertical climb before it tipped into the drink. Height is your friend if ATTI mode kicks in - it give you time to recover control - potentially. The think about ATTI mode is the drone has lost GPS locking so doesn't know where is is in 3d space. This usually is evident as a drift in the horizontal plane, but actually is also true in the vertical plane too. That is why height is your friend in these situations - it keeps your drone above most ground obstacles like trees etc.

GPS is not used to maintain vertical position in a Mavic or any other DJI drone that I'm familiar with, which is why ATTI mode by itself would not have caused his drone to descend.

SH59 Posted at 8-2 13:16
I think if you post the logs...someone will be able to tell what exactly what went wrong, and when.

Maybe he'd prefer we not find out.

907leo Posted at 7-8 21:35
Ya i must say it is pretty ridiculous such a mode is installed on a smart drone. Didn't expect my drone to barrel out of the sky because of software that DJI installed on it. I mean way to protect the 1000 dollars i spent on the drone and the great way to lose footage that i captured. Pretty ridiculous. Great pathetic atti mode.

Atti mode is a smart mode.. attitude hold mode and would be stupid and irresponsible to not include it as a fail safe function.

what if your GPS failed inside your aircraft for any reason..this was a bit of a small issue on some early mavic pro's (1st gens) that cropped up over time and got worse as time grew..sometimes in flight GPS dropped out and came back after a while....what if someone has  GPS jammer and knocks GPS signal out around you and you are 100+ feet up and well beyond VPS range.. or what is software on the drone crashed...?  etc etc etc... what would you expect it to failsafe into..?  for it to just fall out of the sky?...  

   for it to position hold you it needs to be aware of its position.  the fail safe if it cannot do such a thing in flight is to use Attitude hold mode.. the only info it has is IMU and Baro and compass usually, if you are lucky Vision system maybe within range to help...

and FYI, atti mode wouldnt cause increase or decrease in aircraft's hieght unless was something else causing it... bad IMU calibration or bad props or something outside of ATTI itself.  i flown in Atti many times either before a GPS lock or after GPS lock and loss of GPS..  the differance is Atti mode flies like a manual drone and is is way easier to wreck out with...

Gimpy Posted at 8-2 15:14
GPS is not used to maintain vertical position in a Mavic or any other DJI drone that I'm familiar with, which is why ATTI mode by itself would not have caused his drone to descend.

Indeed - I was just making the point that having some height gives one more time to maintain control before the drone flies/falls/drifts into another object or surface. Compass and IMU calibration are critical too. Of course without flight data - we can only speculate as to what actually caused the splash-crash.

" I understand what atti mode is, its supposed to maintain altitude when when under certain conditions."




Where in the world did you hear this? Atti-mode makes the craft not hold position but unsteady losing direction/altitude. You need to maintain manual control of the craft as there's no GPS lock/hold.


One typically should be skilled enough to take control, take precaution and land the craft.

Been a while, and no log file?
Guess he probably already knows the answer........

Watched the video and did hear "ATTI MODE" but if you were screen recording, why not show the water impact?

Weird, I just returned from Utah and had the same thing happen. Was at Diamond fork hot springs and flying the Mavic, or trying to. Took off in GPS and switched to Atti mode. Fell 20 feet into hot spring. I was able to recover the drone and all that was lost was the battery due to an internal short. (Battery swelled) the plastic gimbal clip fractured but I fixed that with plastic weld. So far all is good after a recalibration. I have been into RC flying over 20 years. I understand that any RC is not foolproof and exerytime I fly, I fly with the expectation of failure. There is no foolproof programming, failsafe or garentee. Sorry, but you purchased an expensive civilian flying camera with a hundred things that can go wrong Accept that, and get a new drone or be forever bitter that DJI did you wrong. Not saying DJI is perfect, Far from it. Just understand that no matter the claims made, Its stillan expensive toy

LIVNXXL Posted at 8-7 06:37
Weird, I just returned from Utah and had the same thing happen. Was at Diamond fork hot springs and flying the Mavic, or trying to. Took off in GPS and switched to Atti mode. Fell 20 feet into hot spring. I was able to recover the drone and all that was lost was the battery due to an internal short. (Battery swelled) the plastic gimbal clip fractured but I fixed that with plastic weld. So far all is good after a recalibration. I have been into RC flying over 20 years. I understand that any RC is not foolproof and exerytime I fly, I fly with the expectation of failure. There is no foolproof programming, failsafe or garentee. Sorry, but you purchased an expensive civilian flying camera with a hundred things that can go wrong Accept that, and get a new drone or be forever bitter that DJI did you wrong. Not saying DJI is perfect, Far from it. Just understand that no matter the claims made, Its stillan expensive toy

If you'd like someone to try to figure out what happened, upload the (TXT) flight log to PhantomHelp using these instructions and then post a link to the uploaded log back in this thread.

I fly frequently from a boat,  all sorts of iron to upset the compass, etc . first rule is go up, turn it round a few times to allow the compass to adjust to the area. and...... never be low at low light levels, especially over water.

Gimpy Posted at 8-7 07:01
If you'd like someone to try to figure out what happened, upload the (TXT) flight log to PhantomHelp using these instructions and then post a link to the uploaded log back in this thread.

Thank you for the offer. I know how to review my logs and am aware that I  lost GPS as I came into the shadow of the canyon wall and the shadow and bright sun contrast played sensor havoc. I chose to fly in less than favorable conditions. I was lucky in all I lost was a battery and 3 days of flying as the drone dried out. My bigger point was I chose to fly when and where I did, I know its not DJI's fault and like any other electro-mechanical device, I understand things go wrong.

When I'm trying to rotate Mavic (using left joystick), I very often have ATTI mode:

[["2019-09-22 17:01:03","Warnings","Camera Sensor Error"]],[["2019-09-22 17:01:04","","Compass Interference. Temp Max Altitude: 5m"]],[["2019-09-22 17:01:16","","Satellite Positioning Off. Fly with caution"],["2019-09-22 17:01:22","","Weak GPS signal. Positional accuracy may be compromised. Please fly with caution."],["2019-09-22 17:01:22","","Temp Max Altitude Approached. Wait for Compass Auto Calibration to complete or calibrate compass manually."]],[["2019-09-22 17:01:33","","Temp Max Altitude Approached. Wait for Compass Auto Calibration to complete or calibrate compass manually."]],[["2019-09-22 17:03:11","","Compass Interference. Temp Max Altitude: 5m"],["2019-09-22 17:03:16","","Satellite Positioning Off. Fly with caution"]],[["2019-09-22 17:03:22","","Weak GPS signal. Positional accuracy may be compromised. Please fly with caution."]],[["2019-09-22 17:04:12","","Weak signal. Adjust antenna and avoid signal block."]],[["2019-09-22 17:04:24","","Compass Error. Exit P-GPS Mode"],["2019-09-22 17:04:25","","IMU heading error. Please restart the aircraft."],["2019-09-22 17:04:30","","Weak GPS signal. Positional accuracy may be compromised. Please fly with caution."]],[["2019-09-22 17:05:13","","High wind velocity. Fly with caution and land in a safe place ASAP."],["2019-09-22 17:05:17","","Weak signal. Adjust antenna and avoid signal block."]],[["2019-09-22 17:07:00","","Compass Interference. Temp Max Altitude: 5m"]],[["2019-09-22 17:10:06","","Compass Interference. Temp Max Altitude: 5m"],["2019-09-22 17:10:16","","Weak GPS signal. Positional accuracy may be compromised. Please fly with caution."]],[["2019-09-22 17:10:17","","Compass Redundancy Switch"]]

At the same time I see that there is no GPS signal, in few seconds it becomes 2 (out of 5).

After that I again see 5 out of 5 and 20 satellites.

Is that GPS problem or compass issue?

907leo has left the chat. Together with his flight log...

Gimpy Posted at 8-2 15:14
GPS is not used to maintain vertical position in a Mavic or any other DJI drone that I'm familiar with, which is why ATTI mode by itself would not have caused his drone to descend.

GPS is three dimensional system and is used to maintain height when in GPS mode.
Look at the drone specs for GPS positioning, it gives both the vertical and horizontal positional accuracy for GPS and optical sensors.  However, as the GPS was lost - thereby forcing the drone into ATTI mode - without a suitable ground reference (ie solid ground & not water) height stability would have been easily lost.

Mavic Pro Specification

Hover Accuracy Range

Vertical: +/- 0.1 m (when Vision Positioning is active) or +/-0.5 m Horizontal: +/- 0.3 m (when Vision Positioning is active) or +/-1.5 m

Mavic mini Specification

• Hovering Accuracy Range
• Vertical: ±0.1 m (with Vision Positioning), ±0.5 m (with GPS Positioning)
  Horizontal: ±0.1 m (with Vision Positioning), ±1.5 m (with GPS Positioning)
  
  

Plank! Posted at 10-31 02:55
GPS is three dimensional system and is used to maintain height when in GPS mode.
Look at the drone specs for GPS positioning, it gives both the vertical and horizontal positional accuracy for GPS and optical sensors.  However, as the GPS was lost - thereby forcing the drone into ATTI mode - without a suitable ground reference (ie solid ground & not water) height stability would have been easily lost.

Hi Plank!

DJI uses a barometric sensor to control height, not the GPS signals.
So in ATTI mode height is still controlled, other axis to be controlled manually.

cheers
JJB

Plank! Posted at 10-31 02:55
GPS is three dimensional system and is used to maintain height when in GPS mode.
Look at the drone specs for GPS positioning, it gives both the vertical and horizontal positional accuracy for GPS and optical sensors.  However, as the GPS was lost - thereby forcing the drone into ATTI mode - without a suitable ground reference (ie solid ground & not water) height stability would have been easily lost.

Yes, GPS is three-dimensional, but its elevation accuracy is so poor as to be useless in this context, which is why it isn't used to maintain altitude. So no, GPS has nothing to do with maintaining altitude. The documentation you cited is just contrasting the barometric-based height stability with the stability that comes from using the more precise downward (Vision Positioning) sensors.