Failure!

[Chaosrider]

As part of my quest to bring droning to kids, I was going to finally fly somewhere other than from my house yesterday. There's a restaurant that I go to in Gardnerville a few times a week, which is adjacent to a park. It's outside the controlled airspace around Minden airport, and I confirmed with the Douglas County Parks and Rec Department that there are no rules against flying drones in county parks. I got the sense that no one had asked him the question before, and he said something like, "Just be considerate of other people", which I will most certainly do.

I bought a landing pad months ago, but I've never used it, since both my forward and rear flight decks are hard surfaced. I finished modifying the hardcase that I bought for my Mini-2s so that I could put them in the case with the strobe still on, even the Arc V. I'm really glad that I got the hardcase that allows me to transport the drone unfolded, but secure.

When I got there, I drove around the park to scope out the ideal spot, and I found a great spot, a picnic table at one of the corners which is oriented to face the entire park. It's only about 30 feet from where I parked the car, so no serious schlepping. A couple of trees around it, but completely open in the "to park" direction. I put the landing pad down on the grass, and took the drone out of the case. I took the gimbal cover off, put in a new battery, fired it up, and set it down on the pad.

When I turned the controller on, I got the really annoying beeping indicating that the controller needed to be calibrated, which I did. The first time I had that happen, it wasn't immediately obvious to me what it wanted me to do, but now it's just a minor task. RC calibration completed without incident.

And then the really weird annoying thing happened: the dreaded "DJI Authorization Zone".

I had a devil of a time trying to figure out what it wanted. It wanted to send me a code, but then it said it couldn't send the message, but then the code arrived. I put the code in the appropriate spots, and hit enter. Then it asked me a few questions, weird stuff, like are you authorized to fly here, will you follow all the rules, that kind of thing. I checked all the boxes, and hit enter again, and it pops up with "Your DJI account is not active."

After my initial "WTF?" reaction, I decided I'd burned enough time on it for that day, and packed everything up, and moseyed over to dinner.

This left me with three questions:

1) What do I need to do to (re)activate my DJI account?
2) How does DJI determine what goes into a "DJI Authorization Zone"?
3) Is there a way to disable/bypass these restrictions?

Thanks for any help and guidance that you can provide,

TCS

 

[Kbviper]

Hey Chaosrider. I can't help with some of your questions, and excuse me if this is information that you are already aware of. DJI does a poor job of restricting areas where you can fly. You can check the map at this site before you fly to see if DJI has restricted flying in the area:

DJI FlySafe

www.dji.com

In Canada, Transport Canada (TC) restricts areas where you can fly within a certain distance and heights around certain airports and heliports, as well as prisons, and other locations. While not applicable to the US, here is the link to the map that TC suggests drone operators check:

Drone site selection tool - National Research Council Canada

nrc.canada.ca

If you compare the two maps, there are a lot of differences. DJI fences drones from flying near small airports that TC does not restrict flight around - it is legal to fly there, but DJI geofences them, usually along flight paths and a long way out from the airport.

At the same time, DJI does not geofence the two hospital heliports near my home where TC prohibits drone operation - you would think that DJI would do a better job of aligning restrictions around legal requirements in a particular area.

I am guessing that you were trying to fly somewhere in the blue restricted area on the screenshot below. Not sure if the green areas represent one of the parks you were flying in - it appears that a good part of them is not in the geofenced area.

You should be able to put your email/user name in and password in again to re-activate your account - maybe try logging out and logging in again if you are still logged in but showing as not activated.

There is no easy way to bypass the DJI geofencing - what you tried usually works, or you can explore "Unlocking" in advance at this website:

DJI - The World Leader in Camera Drones/Quadcopters for Aerial Photography

As the market leader in easy-to-fly drones and aerial photography systems, DJI quadcopters like the Phantom are the standard in consumer drone technology.

www.dji.com

Good luck.

 

[Chaosrider]

Does this problem go away if I use Litchi rather than DJI Fly?

Thx,

TCS

 

[eEridani]

Minden has Class E overhead where you were trying to fly, so DJI has the approaches marked as no fly. I think it's as simple as sending DJI a note, getting a key, applying it, and you're good to go. Based on other threads I've read - no personal experience doing this - just make sure DJI Fly is logged into your DJI account when you are doing all this. Probably best done from home.

 

[Paint Rock Drones]

Does this problem go away if I use Litchi rather than DJI Fly?

Thx,

TCS

No, doesn't matter which app. The locking/unlocking is in the drone firmware. But unlocking through the DJI web site isn't hard. This thread may help: Authorization Zone Procedures

 

[careless]

I find that turning on the controller and the DJI app before turning on the drone sometimes works faster.

 

[jaybrad]

I have a private airstrip near where I live that has been unused for 20+ years, but is still on the maps. I was surprised that it caused an issue with my drones and contacted DJI who were great about sending a key that is good for many months (maybe even a year). I still have to upload the key whenever there is a software update which has to be done before takeoff, but that's simple enough to do.

As an aside, I know the former owners of that private strip and they tried to get it removed from the maps after they moved, but the process to do so proved to be rather burdensome and they eventually just gave up.

 

[crlmjohnson]

As part of my quest to bring droning to kids, I was going to finally fly somewhere other than from my house yesterday. There's a restaurant that I go to in Gardnerville a few times a week, which is adjacent to a park. It's outside the controlled airspace around Minden airport, and I confirmed with the Douglas County Parks and Rec Department that there are no rules against flying drones in county parks. I got the sense that no one had asked him the question before, and he said something like, "Just be considerate of other people", which I will most certainly do.

I bought a landing pad months ago, but I've never used it, since both my forward and rear flight decks are hard surfaced. I finished modifying the hardcase that I bought for my Mini-2s so that I could put them in the case with the strobe still on, even the Arc V. I'm really glad that I got the hardcase that allows me to transport the drone unfolded, but secure.

When I got there, I drove around the park to scope out the ideal spot, and I found a great spot, a picnic table at one of the corners which is oriented to face the entire park. It's only about 30 feet from where I parked the car, so no serious schlepping. A couple of trees around it, but completely open in the "to park" direction. I put the landing pad down on the grass, and took the drone out of the case. I took the gimbal cover off, put in a new battery, fired it up, and set it down on the pad.

When I turned the controller on, I got the really annoying beeping indicating that the controller needed to be calibrated, which I did. The first time I had that happen, it wasn't immediately obvious to me what it wanted me to do, but now it's just a minor task. RC calibration completed without incident.

And then the really weird annoying thing happened: the dreaded "DJI Authorization Zone".

I had a devil of a time trying to figure out what it wanted. It wanted to send me a code, but then it said it couldn't send the message, but then the code arrived. I put the code in the appropriate spots, and hit enter. Then it asked me a few questions, weird stuff, like are you authorized to fly here, will you follow all the rules, that kind of thing. I checked all the boxes, and hit enter again, and it pops up with "Your DJI account is not active."

After my initial "WTF?" reaction, I decided I'd burned enough time on it for that day, and packed everything up, and moseyed over to dinner.

This left me with three questions:

1) What do I need to do to (re)activate my DJI account?
2) How does DJI determine what goes into a "DJI Authorization Zone"?
3) Is there a way to disable/bypass these restrictions?

Thanks for any help and guidance that you can provide,

TCS

what you went thru...is normal.

I usually play ahead for all of my flights. I fly all over the place, near airport, control and non-control air space, for work and for fun.

what I mean about planning ahead is check the airspace a day ahead of your flight. if is in an air space next to an airport, then do the unlock at DJI website, turn on your drone at home while connect to the internet, so that the unlock can load into the controller and drone. and this will save you a lot of time and headaches at the site the next.

I use air map and the DJI unlock app for checking the airspace. if the DJI app displays the area as in an control airspace, then do the unlock. it is not going to hurt anything by doing the unlock even if you are authorize to fly in the zone.. it will enable the drone to fly in the airspace you want to fly in.

i.e. make sure that you have check local that you are clear. it seem in this case, you had already done that. and all you need was the drone to fly.

fly and enjoy.

 

[Chaosrider]

Hey Chaosrider. I can't help with some of your questions, and excuse me if this is information that you are already aware of. DJI does a poor job of restricting areas where you can fly. You can check the map at this site before you fly to see if DJI has restricted flying in the area:

DJI FlySafe

www.dji.com

In Canada, Transport Canada (TC) restricts areas where you can fly within a certain distance and heights around certain airports and heliports, as well as prisons, and other locations. While not applicable to the US, here is the link to the map that TC suggests drone operators check:

Drone site selection tool - National Research Council Canada

nrc.canada.ca

If you compare the two maps, there are a lot of differences. DJI fences drones from flying near small airports that TC does not restrict flight around - it is legal to fly there, but DJI geofences them, usually along flight paths and a long way out from the airport.

At the same time, DJI does not geofence the two hospital heliports near my home where TC prohibits drone operation - you would think that DJI would do a better job of aligning restrictions around legal requirements in a particular area.

I am guessing that you were trying to fly somewhere in the blue restricted area on the screenshot below. Not sure if the green areas represent one of the parks you were flying in - it appears that a good part of them is not in the geofenced area.

You should be able to put your email/user name in and password in again to re-activate your account - maybe try logging out and logging in again if you are still logged in but showing as not activated.

There is no easy way to bypass the DJI geofencing - what you tried usually works, or you can explore "Unlocking" in advance at this website:

DJI - The World Leader in Camera Drones/Quadcopters for Aerial Photography

As the market leader in easy-to-fly drones and aerial photography systems, DJI quadcopters like the Phantom are the standard in consumer drone technology.

www.dji.com

Good luck.

View attachment 143120

I sent a message to DJI, and they sent me a detailed process for getting it to work. If it's as easy as it looks, it will be a no-brainer once I get used to it.

I hope it warms up enough that I can try it out this weekend. The current temp is 18º F, and my absolute lower limit for personal comfort it 45 with no wind, 50 if there's no more than a slight breeze.

I'll report back!

Thx,

TCS

 

[Chaosrider]

Minden has Class E overhead where you were trying to fly, so DJI has the approaches marked as no fly. I think it's as simple as sending DJI a note, getting a key, applying it, and you're good to go. Based on other threads I've read - no personal experience doing this - just make sure DJI Fly is logged into your DJI account when you are doing all this. Probably best done from home.

Yup, that was it.

I went to the getting and applying a key process in the field, but the attempt failed because my DJI Fly account wasn't active. I'm not quite sure how to correct that, but hopefully they've explained in the stuff they sent me.

You may be right that it's best done from home. I read somewhere else here that the authorizations are good for 3 days? So maybe I'll try to get it set up tomorrow for my Saturday attempt.

Thx,

TCS

 

[Chaosrider]

No, doesn't matter which app. The locking/unlocking is in the drone firmware. But unlocking through the DJI web site isn't hard. This thread may help: Authorization Zone Procedures

Thx!

TCS

 

[Chaosrider]

what you went thru...is normal.

I usually play ahead for all of my flights. I fly all over the place, near airport, control and non-control air space, for work and for fun.

what I mean about planning ahead is check the airspace a day ahead of your flight. if is in an air space next to an airport, then do the unlock at DJI website, turn on your drone at home while connect to the internet, so that the unlock can load into the controller and drone. and this will save you a lot of time and headaches at the site the next.

I use air map and the DJI unlock app for checking the airspace. if the DJI app displays the area as in an control airspace, then do the unlock. it is not going to hurt anything by doing the unlock even if you are authorize to fly in the zone.. it will enable the drone to fly in the airspace you want to fly in.

i.e. make sure that you have check local that you are clear. it seem in this case, you had already done that. and all you need was the drone to fly.

fly and enjoy.

This is the first time I've flown away from my house. I checked the FAA airspace, and got approval from the county Parks and Rec, but it didn't occur to me that I'd need to get DJI approval too. I'll know to do that the next time I plan to fly from a new spot.

Thx,

TCS

 

[snowghost]

Did a DJI unlock for Class D Airspace which has auto waiver. My RTH didn't work. It would just hover. Then realized it was set higher than the unlock altitude of 150'.

Normally have it set higher due to tall trees where I usually fly. So good reminder to check it every flight.

 

[RussOnTheRoad]

....I had a devil of a time trying to figure out what it wanted. ...

I hear your pain brother. Sometimes it's just one baffling thing after another trying to get one of these drones off the ground. We are in the infancy of drone flight and these problems it seems to me are (hopefully just) the inevitable growing pains of new technologies.

 

[Lespaxvera]

Does this problem go away if I use Litchi rather than DJI Fly?

Thx,

TCS

Unfortunately NO. The best way is to Drone-Hack to unlock everything. See website. I got my Magic 2 Zoom unlock by them. It cost 40 euro.
Good luck

 

[Mr. Rocketman]

I sent a message to DJI, and they sent me a detailed process for getting it to work. If it's as easy as it looks, it will be a no-brainer once I get used to it.

I hope it warms up enough that I can try it out this weekend. The current temp is 18º F, and my absolute lower limit for personal comfort it 45 with no wind, 50 if there's no more than a slight breeze.

I'll report back!

Thx,

TCS

Could you post that detailed process please?