I had an unusual (normal?) experience today. I'm flying at about 7000' near Taos, NM. My intent was to fly 460' down into the Rio Grande Gorge--I was on the edge of the Gorge 10 mi west of Taos. It was a very hot day near noon time and warming up. Frequently a popup window said the battery was too warm to charge. Going down was no problem. Got some excellent images of the river at about 50'. I was out about 1600' and did not have line of sight to the drone. As I brought it back, planning to gain line-of-sight, I could not see the drone. It was supposed to be about 50' above the launch site. At one point, I thought I could hear it faintly but I never did see it. It apparently was moving tangentially to me about 300' away--my hearing is not great otherwise I might have been able to sight it. The plateau around me did have some higher points but I doubt more than 30' higher. If my DJI quad-copter was 50' above launch, it should not have crashed. In any case, it did crash from my FPV, but I did not know where...last distance indicated 298'. After hiking a couple hills, I went home dejected,. At home, I pulled up my flight log for the day, and it was obvious exactly where my drone had crashed. I used Google Earth to get still a better view of its location, rushed back, and immediately located the drone. It seems undamaged. Happy ending and quite amazing. In analyzing what happened, (1) I should have brought it back at 100' rather than 50', and (2) I think the extremely hot and variable conditions caused an error in the height reading. I believe the drone was flying closer to 20-30' above launch rather than the indicated 50'.
Keith/Chekika
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