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Crushed....

Indy443

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Long story short: I lost my beloved Mavic Air yesterday afternoon. While flying a short litchi mission from my house, I lost contact with the drone (for the first time ever) about 3/4 of the way through the mission. Without panicking I hit the RTH button, expecting to hear the drone buzzing towards me as I always do. Then, silence.
Suddenly I get signal back and can see the drone is clearly stuck, very high, in a pine tree. NOOOO!!!
I have 65% battery and am getting a clear video link, so I set out in my truck to see if I can locate and retrieve the drone. After much hard tracking I feel 99.9% sure I have located the huge pine the drone is in. I can’t visibly see the drone which is driving me crazy. Battery dies eventually before I realize I could have attempted to *ding the drone via the DJI Go4 app. Tree is directly in the back yard of someone’s house and is massive, well over 100ft, with zero climbing branches and surrounded by smaller shade trees, making the view tricky into the crown where I *think the drone is.
Last night passes and I check again this morning at the base of tree, hoping that the drone fell out overnight. But nothing.
What do I do?
My question is, if the drone is truly stuck for good (there is no way someone is going up the tree) can I replace just the drone? Will my controller and remaining two batteries work with the replacement?
I am just bumming hard, and the thought of nearly knowing where the drone is, knowing it won’t come down without a miracle, and needing a replacement ASAP is just crushing me. I have flow this MA safely and successfully for over 60 missions. Smart flying is critical to me and it was a shock when I lost the video signal. I was confident that my pre set RTH parameters would get me home, and was shocked to see the screen flicker to life with the drone clearly stuck.
What to do? What would you do in this situation?
 

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Sad story,this is uneducated, but believe logical guess that the controller and batteries will. Whatwas your RTH altitude set at?
 
A tree service company might be able to get it down for you. I imagine they could have gear for climbing.

Or a chainsaw.
 
Totally agree, companies (individuals) who make a living safely cutting down trees could scamper up that tree like nobody's business. Now, do you want to take a chance to have to pay them if it actually isn't there? Good question.
 
Precisely. Seems like a lot of risk to initiate something like this. Also considering this tree is located directly in the back yard of a private residence. I don't want to make my problem theirs....and invade their privacy with a rescue operation for a drone that is not verifiably there.

Just a frustrating situation all the way around.
 
I'd let the tree service company in my yard to search for your drone. Good Idea. Certainly worth the $1000 investment in your drone.
 
Do you have a friend with a drone that can fly around the tree to confirm that it’s there . If you tell the owners what’s going on chances are they will be ok with you looking as long as you don’t hurt there tree
 
I wonder how it got near that tree... Carefully planned route and safe flying says it wouldn't be a problem.

I'd recommend you get someone to help you fly around and locate it, gain permission from property owners. And investigate retrieving it, I bet you could talk to a tree company and offer the guy a 24 to come Do the job after hours and he would lol
 
What are you implying? I’ve never had any issue with a Litchi mission. Maybe you don’t know how to use the app.

I don't want to know how to use the app thanks. I see enough "So there I was on my Litchi mission when....[insert appropriate SNAFU]..".

There are few limited circumstances in which these "missions" are appropriate. Everyone else is playing at being Tom Cruise because theres an app that lets them do it. Stick to Scientology.
 
I wonder how it got near that tree... Carefully planned route and safe flying says it wouldn't be a problem.

I'd recommend you get someone to help you fly around and locate it, gain permission from property owners. And investigate retrieving it, I bet you could talk to a tree company and offer the guy a 24 to come Do the job after hours and he would lol
My guess is the tree is taller than the RTH altitude...
 
I would knock on the door of the home owner and explain what happened. They may let you into the back yard so you can scope out the pine tree from different angles. If they balk, offer them $50 if they let you try to recover the drone. That's much cheaper than replacing the drone.
 
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