First crash

[Photo Booth]

I had my first (and only) crash of my Mavic Pro Platinum about 18 months ago. I was flying along a loading dock shooting video of a bunch of parked cars. I wanted a wider angle view for still photos and carefully backed my Mavic up a bit toward the wall next to the loading dock and lifted it a little higher toward the overhang of the roof. I shot a few photos and then, suddenly, my Mavic got sucked into the wall. I watched it happen, my hands weren't even on the sticks. It's my belief that prop wash was a factor. I simply got too darned close to the wall and the overhang (eaves) of the roof.

The crash destroyed 3 propellers and broke one of the rear legs on my Mavic (I threw out the 4th propeller, just in case). I purchased a genuine DJI replacement leg via Amazon and installed it myself (yes, I know how to solder). My Mavic flies like new, you'd never know it was ever damaged except for some scrapes on the case of one of my batteries.

It was TOTALLY my own fault for flying too close to the wall and overhang. I'm not blaming this on DJI and I'm not blaming it on being unlucky. I got too darn close to the wall. MY FAULT!

I thought some of you might like to hear a story from someone that isn't blaming DJI!

Mark

 

[bumper]

Yes, they do suffer from "suck attraction", as I learned the hard way back in 1990 with a scale 50 model helicopter (they only had gyro stabilized tail rotors back then) - hovering was a bit like balancing a ball on a stick!

 

[izometric]

Yes, never fly leeward next to a roof eave. The largest turbulence that you can have around a building, are developing immediately around the corners of the windward facade and under the leeward eaves.

I don't know about the part 107 training, but in EASA A1-A3 training they teach you to mind these things.

 

[slup]

... my Mavic got sucked into the wall.
... I simply got too darned close to the wall and the overhang (eaves) of the roof.

And a lousy horizontal position hold due to covering most of the satellites in the sky that close to the wall & overhang ... most probably had a lot to do with this also.

 

[Flycaster]

Yes, they do suffer from "suck attraction", as I learned the hard way back in 1990 with a scale 50 model helicopter (they only had gyro stabilized tail rotors back then) - hovering was a bit like balancing a ball on a stick!

More like a ball bearing on a glass plate....

 

[Photo Booth]

And a lousy horizontal position hold due to covering most of the satellites in the sky that close to the wall & overhang ... most probably had a lot to do with this also.

This was a commercial building, not a home. The overhang was only about 12 inches deep and only the back edge of the spinning props were under the overhang. About 18” below the overhang. But that put the back edge of the props about 11” from the wall. Too close!

Mark

 

[slup]

This was a commercial building, not a home. The overhang was only about 12 inches deep and only the back edge of the spinning props were under the overhang. About 18” below the overhang. But that put the back edge of the props about 11” from the wall. Too close!

Mark

But being close to a wall... on a commercial building, doesn't make the sky shielding effect less ... just being close took away approx 50% of the visible sky from the AC perspective ... & by that possibly losing too many GPS satellites & making the positional hold less accurate.

Without logs from the flight to investigate it's only a speculation though ... but surely a possibility as we have seen just that in other cases..