Finally the dreaded flyaway happened to me...

Cutaway · May 21, 2017

Guys, after 96 flights without issues, my Mavic went AWOL and flew away.

Spoiler: Good news is that the RTH button on the RC worked. It kicked in, returned home, and landed. I'm so thankful!

So, is this incident in the category of "life happens, be thankful, and move on?" Or should ground my Mavic until I call DJI to troubleshoot?

AirData: Airdata UAV - Flight Data Analysis for Drones

[-- More Details --]
1. Normal takeoff like the other 96 flights. Good GPS, home point set, took off to 40 feet and hover, etc.
2. Blue sky. No man-made obstructions at the altitude it went bonkers. Good RC and video signals.
3. I didn't catch the warnings (happened fast). Then it switched to ATTI.
4. No problem, I can fly in ATTI so I think. Nope, it just flew away even with my control inputs. No response.
5. Mavic goes BVLOS so I started walking fast towards it. And I press the RTH button on the RC repeatedly.
6. Smart RTH kicks in. Sigh of relief. Praying that it comes back to the HP.
7. Lands itself perfectly. I quickly turn it off and hug the Mavic like a mother would with her child. ;-)

I see two warnings...
Warning:Compass Error. Exit P-GPS Mode
Warning:[IMU]heading exception (In Flight) please switch to atti mode if craft behave abnormally
then...Mode changed to GPS_Atti

Venombreed · May 21, 2017

Cutaway said:
Guys, after 96 flights without issues, my Mavic went AWOL and flew away.

7. Lands itself perfectly. I quickly turn it off and hug the Mavic like a mother would with her child. ;-)

You never met my Mother

but glad you got it back Thumbswayup

Venom

rydfree · May 21, 2017

"And I press the RTH button on the RC repeatedly."

RTH button is a toggle action that activates RTH then deactivates it upon the next press of the button . You have to press and hold for a second though or it doesn't do anything .

IMO it should be programmed to activate RTH only and the pause button should disable it . If you're not careful you can panic and press it thinking you are activating RTH when it may already be RTH .

cheekymonkeyman · May 21, 2017

Cutaway said:
Guys, after 96 flights without issues, my Mavic went AWOL and flew away.

Spoiler: Good news is that the RTH button on the RC worked. It kicked in, returned home, and landed. I'm so thankful!

So, is this incident in the category of "life happens, be thankful, and move on?" Or should ground my Mavic until I call DJI to troubleshoot?

AirData: Airdata UAV - Flight Data Analysis for Drones

[-- More Details --]
1. Normal takeoff like the other 96 flights. Good GPS, home point set, took off to 40 feet and hover, etc.
2. Blue sky. No man-made obstructions at the altitude it went bonkers. Good RC and video signals.
3. I didn't catch the warnings (happened fast). Then it switched to ATTI.
4. No problem, I can fly in ATTI so I think. Nope, it just flew away even with my control inputs. No response.
5. Mavic goes BVLOS so I started walking fast towards it. And I press the RTH button on the RC repeatedly.
6. Smart RTH kicks in. Sigh of relief. Praying that it comes back to the HP.
7. Lands itself perfectly. I quickly turn it off and hug the Mavic like a mother would with her child. ;-)

I see two warnings...
Warning:Compass Error. Exit P-GPS Mode
Warning:[IMU]heading exception (In Flight) please switch to atti mode if craft behave abnormally
then...Mode changed to GPS_Atti

Sounds very much like something which happened to me a few months back... IMU heading exception error after only a few yards flying followed by a drone which chose to fly off at high speed despite any stick inputs... and there was almost no wind. 20 seconds later it kicked back in to normal operation and faithfully awaited my commands to bring it back home (phew). I never discovered the cause. I flew immediately over water, past some active boats with gps, adjacent but not inside a NFZ for a radio transmitter, immediately after upgrade... could be many things. I have flown many times since without recurrence. Any debugging DJI give you won't make it more or less likely to happen again so I chose to keep going... and I now have even more positive memories of flying.

Cutaway · May 21, 2017

rydfree said:
"And I press the RTH button on the RC repeatedly."

RTH button is a toggle action that activates RTH then deactivates it upon the next press of the button . You have to press and hold for a second though or it doesn't do anything .

IMO it should be programmed to activate RTH only and the pause button should disable it . If you're not careful you can panic and press it thinking you are activating RTH when it may already be RTH .

Rydfree, I forgot to mention the panic that engulfed me. It was 18 seconds of hell. I was listening for the familiar RTH tone...which it did.

Maybe we all need to regularly do some fire drill. Have a friend suddenly come behind you, slip a pillow case over you, slap your face, spin you around a few times, and then shout nonsense.

During this time, we practice pressing the RTH once (hold for 1.5 seconds) until the RTH kicks in. [emoji23][emoji23][emoji23]

J/k. I hear you about the RTH button. I've used it many times properly. Panic impaired me.

rydfree · May 21, 2017

Cutaway said:
Rydfree, I forgot to mention the panic that engulfed me. It was 18 seconds of ****. I was listening for the familiar RTH tone...which it did.

Maybe we all need to regularly do some fire drill. Have a friend suddenly come behind you, slip a pillow case over you, slap your face, spin you around a few times, and then shout nonsense.

During this time, we practice pressing the RTH once (hold for 1.5 seconds) until the RTH kicks in. [emoji23][emoji23][emoji23]

J/k. I hear you about the RTH button. I've used it many times properly. Panic impaired me.

You've just described flying with my friends ,LOL