First DJI Failure Ever

[Hugabeen]

Sorry in advance if this has been covered before. I'm a very experienced pilot with years of DJI flights with no crashes or major mishaps. I just had my new Mavic Mini become possessed by the Devil today and took a nose-dive into the snow. (Slow and low, but completely unresponsive to commands from the stick) A simple flight, low altitude and close-in line of sight. The flight record shows multiple errors, none of which were displayed on my app interface screen. Is this happening a lot? Is there a pre-flight step or condition I am missing unique to the Mavic Mini? Aircraft is fine and restarted with no issues or damage, but now I absolutely do not trust the little camera bird any farther than I can throw it. Here's the link to the flight:
Thanks folks.

 

[Meta4]

Mavic Mini took a nose-dive into the snow. (Slow and low, but completely unresponsive to commands from the stick)

Your flight data looks like this: DJI Flight Log Viewer - PhantomHelp.com
The relevant info from the data is that you descended from 35 ft and centred the left stick at 2:23.2 with the drone at 24 ft.
The drone continued to descend with no throttle input.
At 2:25.6 it had reached 13 ft and you gave it full left stick to climb.
The drone continued to descend anyway and crashed at 2:27.3.

The flight record shows multiple errors, none of which were displayed on my app interface screen.
Is this happening a lot?

The messages only show in Airdata and are not showing in Phantomhelp log viewer.
If they were real, they are likely to be a false alarm and not related to the crash.
Although not a lot, there have been a small number of similar mysterious uncommanded descents, mostly from low altitudes.

Quite puzzling and it might be one for @sar104 to look into.

 

[new2mavic]

I have downloaded the csv file and the major finding is that at the beginning, the drone drew a current of about 5A when hovering ( zero x/y/z speed, zero pitch and roll angle ) with no stick input ( rc_elevator / rc_aileron / rc_throttle / rc_rudder = 1024 ) . Then the hovering current increased gradually over time to as much as 11A before the crash. It seems to me that some of the ESC/motor/propeller were failing so more and more current was needed to generate enough thrust to keep the drone level and maintain the altitude. Ultimately the current went up to the limit and the drone could no longer stay airbrone. This is consistent with the message "Not Enough Force/ESC Error". If you can provide the .DAT file, more details can be seen.

 

[Detritalgeo]

What was the temperature? The mini can give warnings of low power output when it is too cold.. Especially when on the lower end of charge.

 

[Hugabeen]

What was the temperature? The mini can give warnings of low power output when it is too cold.. Especially when on the lower end of charge.

Temp outside was hovering around freezing. +-32f. I had warm batteries and let aircraft reached ambient exterior temp before installing battery from body temperature in my pocket. Waited for AC to power up and gain gps lock before flight. Done this many times and much much colder with M2P and never any isdues. I'm guessing cold weather isn't going to play nice with the Mini as it has flown flawlessly in 45-50 Fahrenheit temps so far. But now I will probably never risk flying the Mini over water. Just can't trust it...

 

[RayOZ]

Being close to freezing and relatively high humidity, it might be icing on the props, which would reduce lift.

 

[Hugabeen]

Being close to freezing and relatively high humidity, it might be icing on the props, which would reduce lift.

Good thought. I was able to inspect the aircraft within seconds of impact and there was no ice other moisture on the props. It did behave oddly just a few moments after lift off though. I placed it into a hover to compose a photograph of an old building and it suddenly changed altitude by descending and ascending rather dramatically with no stick input from me. I decided to leave it alone for a moment in case it was an IMU or downward sensor issue to see if it would resolve on its own and it sort of did for a moment so I proceeded to attempt to capture the photographs I wanted. But then it went all cattywampus again and when I tried to bring it in, it decided to auger itself into ground. Glad I was close to the ground and moving slow I guess.