Aircraft Disconnected message. What happened?

[KLJ5]

Hi everyone. While recently flying my Mavic 2 Pro, I experienced a malfunction that I'm having difficulty explaining. Highlighting the series of events was a screen that froze with the last recorded image in black and white, and there it stayed for the rest of the flight. Although the system status bar indicated 'Aircraft Disconnected', the remote controller signal showed 5 bars, as did the video signal strength bars. The GPS signal strength was greyed out, as were telemetry indications and Smart RTH button; APAS system red. Control of the drone was perfectly normal. Attached are a couple of images - one just before the event and one just after the event. Anyone else ever experienced this, or anyone think they know what was going on?

 

[KB9Radio]

It sounds like GO4 app crashed, but the controller was otherwise working fine. Maybe a memory issue or something like that. Next time try restarting the GO4 app. Also make sure you're firmware and app are all up to date. The controller itself will work without the screen working at all. If you wanted it to initiate RTH you would need to turn the controller off so it loses connection. Otherwise it will sit and wait for stick input till the battery gets down to the point where RTH is initiated.

 

[KLJ5]

It sounds like GO4 app crashed, but the controller was otherwise working fine. Maybe a memory issue or something like that. Next time try restarting the GO4 app. Also make sure you're firmware and app are all up to date. The controller itself will work without the screen working at all. If you wanted it to initiate RTH you would need to turn the controller off so it loses connection. Otherwise it will sit and wait for stick input till the battery gets down to the point where RTH is initiated.

Hi and thanks for your feedback. I'm using the DJI Smart Controller, and yes, it was working fine. I'm not terribly smart when it comes to apps, so I'm not clear on what you mean by "try restarting the GO4 app". How would I do that within the controller during flight please? The startup message indicated that the firmware was up to date prior to the flight. As I'm sure you know, RTH will only work if GPS signals are being received and processed. I'm not clear given the fact that the GPS icon was greyed out that the GPS signals were being processed although the drone hovered normally, so the signals were likely to have been processed. Supporting this theory is that the red 'diamond' in the small map at the bottom left of the controller screen was changing position when I moved the drone. This is the second time I've had this type of situation with 2 different Mavic 2 Pro drones. This time, I was doing figure 8's with lots of control input and the previous time, I was flying in strong gusty wind. Someone suggested to me that the flight controller may have been temporarily overloaded. In both cases, having landed and shut the drone completely down, startup and subsequent flights were perfectly normal.

 

[KB9Radio]

Hi and thanks for your feedback. I'm using the DJI Smart Controller, and yes, it was working fine. I'm not terribly smart when it comes to apps, so I'm not clear on what you mean by "try restarting the GO4 app". How would I do that within the controller during flight please? The startup message indicated that the firmware was up to date prior to the flight. As I'm sure you know, RTH will only work if GPS signals are being received and processed. I'm not clear given the fact that the GPS icon was greyed out that the GPS signals were being processed although the drone hovered normally, so the signals were likely to have been processed. Supporting this theory is that the red 'diamond' in the small map at the bottom left of the controller screen was changing position when I moved the drone. This is the second time I've had this type of situation with 2 different Mavic 2 Pro drones. This time, I was doing figure 8's with lots of control input and the previous time, I was flying in strong gusty wind. Someone suggested to me that the flight controller may have been temporarily overloaded. In both cases, having landed and shut the drone completely down, startup and subsequent flights were perfectly normal.

I'm not at home right now, but if I remember correctly there's a button on the front left side that has a curly arrow on it indicating go back. If you press it once it goes back one screen, press it again and it will say to press it again to exit (GO4). After you do that you are back to the initial controller screen where you can press "Go" and start GO4 app again. I've never tried that with the drone in the air and will have to experiment with it myself at close range to see if it reconnects to the aircraft/camera properly. There's probably other ways to force stop the app, but I don't remember right off hand.