Almost lost Mavic in the wind!

Mykeee · Feb 18, 2017

Last night I my wife looked out the window and commented on how beautiful the sky looked with the sunset, so I quickly took the mavic out to get some cool shots. The wind at ground level was strong, but nothing I haven't flown in before. I took it up to about 100-120 feet straight above my head and started snapping pictures. A couple minutes later I looked up an the drone had drifted considerably. Probably about a 1/4 mile! I guess the wind was a lot stronger up there! I was getting strong wind warnings but ignored them as I was just going up, taking a few pictures and coming back down. Oh, did I mention my mavic battery was at about 33%? So when I noticed the mavic had drifted the battery was already down to about 22%, so I immediately started manually flying back home. The speed was only about 12 km/hr and dropped to 5 as I was flying into the wind. I panicked and put it in return to home mode but the speed was no faster and battery life was dropping fast. It was on its was home but was over a field (we live in the country) and if it were to emergency land there, I would be up to my knees in mud trying to retrieve it! I quickly jumped in the car and drove in the general direction and caught up with it trying to come home about 1/8 mile from home. I managed to get it to land on the side of the road as the battery dropped to 9%! It may have made it home, but that experience almost gave me a heart attack and taught me a lesson to pay more attention to wind. Just happy I didn't have to trudge through knee deep mud to get it back!

CyberNate · Feb 18, 2017

When in "Return to Home" mode, you can push the right stick (pitch) forward for more speed. This helps if you're flying into the wind. Of course you also have the option of using sport mode for even more pitch.

DerekG · Feb 18, 2017

Just remember that Sport Mode draws even more energy and will deplete your battery quicker

I know it's super conservative, however, by 50% battery left I'm usually figuring out what I still want to do before landing / how much energy it's going to take. Discharging below 10% (Even 20% honestly) is quite hard on your batteries and if done often will shorten their lifespan

Mavic Dan · Feb 18, 2017

I think your best bet would have been to drop altitude to avoid the higher speed wind. It looks very flat there but it still should have helped your ground speed.

msinger · Feb 18, 2017

Mykeee said:
Oh, did I mention my mavic battery was at about 33%?

You got lucky for sure. Make sure you're charged up to 100% before taking off next time and you'll be in good shape even if you do hit a little wind

CC Rider · Feb 18, 2017

Mykeee said:
View attachment 6585 Last night I my wife looked out the window and commented on how beautiful the sky looked with the sunset, so I quickly took the mavic out to get some cool shots. The wind at ground level was strong, but nothing I haven't flown in before. I took it up to about 100-120 feet straight above my head and started snapping pictures. A couple minutes later I looked up an the drone had drifted considerably. Probably about a 1/4 mile! I guess the wind was a lot stronger up there! I was getting strong wind warnings but ignored them as I was just going up, taking a few pictures and coming back down. Oh, did I mention my mavic battery was at about 33%? So when I noticed the mavic had drifted the battery was already down to about 22%, so I immediately started manually flying back home. The speed was only about 12 km/hr and dropped to 5 as I was flying into the wind. I panicked and put it in return to home mode but the speed was no faster and battery life was dropping fast. It was on its was home but was over a field (we live in the country) and if it were to emergency land there, I would be up to my knees in mud trying to retrieve it! I quickly jumped in the car and drove in the general direction and caught up with it trying to come home about 1/8 mile from home. I managed to get it to land on the side of the road as the battery dropped to 9%! It may have made it home, but that experience almost gave me a heart attack and taught me a lesson to pay more attention to wind. Just happy I didn't have to trudge through knee deep mud to get it back!

You DID manage to grab a great shot, though. Good job!

Sent from my iPhone using MavicPilots

TacAir42 · Feb 18, 2017

You can also slew the craft around in an arc and bring it home with the winds help. I've done that before. It worked great!

Cyberpower678 · Feb 18, 2017

When I know there is a high wind, I alway start my flight by flying into the wind, that way I can just ride on the way back to save battery.

PropPilot · Feb 18, 2017

My battery warning is set to 50%. Yes, the beep is annoying however regardless of how far out I got, I have a great chance of getting it back. Same with Cyber, fly the outbound into the headwind. If you are sucking wind coming back, right to sport mode and boot it (assuming you started back with good charge left). Winds at altitude increase so whatever you feel on the ground is best case.

sonof40 · Feb 18, 2017

Great shot so it was worth it but the mistake wasn't the wind it was the battery. Even if it showed 33% it will always be less because of start-up, take-off and warm-up.

_milo_ · Feb 18, 2017

msinger said:
You got lucky for sure. Make sure you're charged up to 100% before taking off next time and you'll be in good shape even if you do hit a little wind

THIS!
Never fly with a partially charged pack, make it a hard fast rule, I may hover some partially charged packs to get them down to 50% if I'm not flying for a while, but thats it.

Glad you got it back.

BD0G · Feb 18, 2017

Does horizon line seem very skewed to anyone else? Perhaps wind was pitching Mavic Pro causing it. Do non wind influenced pics have straight horizon?

jlobo3778 · Feb 18, 2017

DerekG said:
Just remember that Sport Mode draws even more energy and will deplete your battery quicker

I know it's super conservative, however, by 50% battery left I'm usually figuring out what I still want to do before landing / how much energy it's going to take. Discharging below 10% (Even 20% honestly) is quite hard on your batteries and if done often will shorten their lifespan

At what percentage should you normally charge the battery?

Sent from my SM-N920T using MavicPilots mobile app

Achilles · Feb 18, 2017

Great lesson and thank you for sharing.

For me, the best ting to do is drop in elevation to lower wind speed and conserve battery life. That way, if you do need to land, you have battery life to look for a location you can drive to and not stress.

Wombat55 · Feb 18, 2017

You only realized that the drone had drifted due to the wind when you looked up and visually sighted it? The Mavic itself should have been able to detect that it was no longer able to lock its position due to the wind being too strong, and I would have thought that there would have been some sort of controller alert about that.

Dan Dawson · Feb 18, 2017

Here's a tip... if you are flying in high winds in regular mode sometimes it will drift due to the limited pitch capabilities of the Mavic. When the wind gust dies down the Mavic will return to it's original point before blown off course. But here's the trick, if you do switch to Sport mode the Mavic has a lot more pitch available to it, and it will hold it's position in higher winds better.

For your specific case of trying to get it to come back home, I would recommend switching to Sport mode, descending a bit to get out of the higher winds, and fly it back home manually as fast as you could.

If the winds are so strong that the Mavic can't hold it's position in Sport mode... you should not be flying

Blucenturion · Feb 18, 2017

Mykeee said:
View attachment 6585 Last night I my wife looked out the window and commented on how beautiful the sky looked with the sunset, so I quickly took the mavic out to get some cool shots. The wind at ground level was strong, but nothing I haven't flown in before. I took it up to about 100-120 feet straight above my head and started snapping pictures. A couple minutes later I looked up an the drone had drifted considerably. Probably about a 1/4 mile! I guess the wind was a lot stronger up there! I was getting strong wind warnings but ignored them as I was just going up, taking a few pictures and coming back down. Oh, did I mention my mavic battery was at about 33%? So when I noticed the mavic had drifted the battery was already down to about 22%, so I immediately started manually flying back home. The speed was only about 12 km/hr and dropped to 5 as I was flying into the wind. I panicked and put it in return to home mode but the speed was no faster and battery life was dropping fast. It was on its was home but was over a field (we live in the country) and if it were to emergency land there, I would be up to my knees in mud trying to retrieve it! I quickly jumped in the car and drove in the general direction and caught up with it trying to come home about 1/8 mile from home. I managed to get it to land on the side of the road as the battery dropped to 9%! It may have made it home, but that experience almost gave me a heart attack and taught me a lesson to pay more attention to wind. Just happy I didn't have to trudge through knee deep mud to get it back!

This mos def ain't California! I'll guess; Minnesota?

bakerboy · Feb 18, 2017

If you have OA on then your angle of attack is even less, try turning it off and seeing if it fights the wind better, otherwise drop altitude, and if that doesnt work then use sports mode

4wd · Feb 19, 2017

bakerboy said:
If you have OA on then your angle of attack is even less, try turning it off and seeing if it fights the wind better, otherwise drop altitude, and if that doesnt work then use sports mode

Yes Obstacle Avoidance reduces the top speed by about half and that includes how fast it can fly into wind to maintain position.
For most flights it's best off, it can also cause problems with flying towards the sun as noted elsewhere.
You can still have the radar thing live and it will warn you of obstacles - but not stop or go slower.

larkin · Feb 19, 2017

4wd said:
Yes Obstacle Avoidance reduces the top speed by about half and that includes how fast it can fly into wind to maintain position.
For most flights it's best off, it can also cause problems with flying towards the sun as noted elsewhere.
You can still have the radar thing live and it will warn you of obstacles - but not stop or go slower.

So true! Today I had OA off and the Mav was rock solid hovering in 30mph winds. I switched to active tracking mode while we walked around the park and turned on OA (first time in a long while) since it was the first time trying that intelligent flying mode and wanting the drone to do its best not to run into trees or other obstacles behind us. When I replaced the battery and took off (with OA still enabled), the thing could not hold its position and drifted away and I had to do all I could to prevent it from smacking into a concrete partition. OA struck on my first flight as well - Mav switched to ATTI indoors and the OA speed limit was too low to allow me to fight against the Mav's own wind interference at low hover. Stay far FAR away from OA. It's the opposite of a safety feature.