Here’s how easily you could lose a Mavic Mini to wind over open waters

[ChristophB]

I’d be really interested to know why you made the choice to fly with two elevated risk factors.

The best answer is probably that I underestimated the risk, particularly since it wasn’t windy at the shore.

Also I am used to flying the Mavic 2 Zoom for which wind never was a problem.

I certainly wouldn’t do it again and hope others learn from my mistake.

 

[ChristophB]

. . . if flight logs were posted, some analysis could be done to confirm @ChristophB

Here we go...

 

[Meta4]

Here we go...

The format of the airdata CSV file is awkward to read.
Any chance of posting the .txt file on its own?

 

[ChristophB]

The format of the airdata CSV file is awkward to read.
Any chance of posting the .txt file on its own?

Does that work? How can I make sense of this on a Mac?

 

[Meta4]

Does that work? How can I make sense of this on a Mac?

Perfect
Put into the Phantomhelp log viewer, you get this:

DJI Flight Log Viewer | Phantom Help

Upload and view flight logs from your DJI drones

www.phantomhelp.com

 

[Meta4]

It's all downwind fun until you turn for home around 9:21.
At first you climb to 190 ft where at full speed in P-GPS mode, the drone is making 10-11 mph .. but that's backwards.
you then dropped down to 120 ft and gave Sport Mode a go.
At 10:15 down lower at 57 ft, the your speed was 7-8 mph in the right direction and the battery down to 53%.
But the wind is gusty and 10 seconds later speed is 3-4mph, but still in the right direction.

At 11:26 and down to 16 ft, progress is around 5-7 mph
You brought it down to 4-5 ft and speed varies between 5-9 mph with gusts still slowing things.
After 12:40, the drone is down a little lower, 3.3 ft above launch height and speed is improved at 10-11 mph (but 5 mph in gusts) with 1600 ft to go and battery at 18%.
You go lower, down to 1.3 ft above launch height at 13:13 and speed increases to 14-17 mph until you land at 14:20 and the battery at 29%.

 

[MAvic_South_Oz]

Wow, now THAT is a remote island

I was mainly interested in the part that you posted in the original video, to see if you did the best on orientation with the few doglegs in the trip to home point.
But looking at that attitude indicator in the log viewer, you can see how all the flight was affected by that strong wind from the SE.
Pity that gauge isn't on the Fly app !

I guess with the increase in altitude at 09:15 to 09:35 (to 195') you probably started noticing things not quite right ?
Glad you brought it down then to that ~ 55' level immediately after that.

From that 11:00 mark when you started coming back home proper, you did have the direction as best you could, it was the wind / gusts that caused a little drift to the north at times.
Just that little stick hiccup about 490' from home, I think the wind may have had a hand in that too, as you were pitching almost right into it there until that final turn to home 300' away.

Overall your stick inputs were almost perfect for a retrieval, and the low alt saved your mini.

Noted that even after 14m 23s of flight, much of it under great pressure on the MM battery, landing battery was still at 29%, not bad considering.

Great lessons here for all drone pilots.

 

[Prismatic]

<<*snip*>>...
After 12:40, the drone is ...<*snip*> ... with 1600 ft to go and battery at 18%.
You go lower, ...<*snip*> ... until you land at 14:20 and the battery at 29%.

So in the 2 minutes and 40 seconds between 12:40 and 14:20, the battery regains 11% of its charge?

How does that work? ?

 

[Thomas B]

So in the 2 minutes and 40 seconds between 12:40 and 14:20, the battery regains 11% of its charge?

How does that work? ?

Battery readout is constantly recompiled by the software. Example: turning from upwind (headwind) travel to downwind (tailwind) travel will do this as will changing altitude into lesser winds, etc.

 

[MAvic_South_Oz]

Battery readout is constantly recompiled by the software. Example: turning from upwind (headwind) travel to downwind (tailwind) travel will do this as will changing altitude into lesser winds, etc.

This is exclusive to the mini I guess ?
Never had this on the M1P or Spark.

Kinda makes sense with the different chemistry batteries, the Li-ion does pull power under load and the all might provide whatever charge is forthcoming when under pressure or otherwise.

 

[Thomas B]

This is exclusive to the mini I guess ?
Never had this on the M1P or Spark.

Kinda makes sense with the different chemistry batteries, the Li-ion does pull power under load and the all might provide whatever charge is forthcoming when under pressure or otherwise.

Definitely see it on my M2P.... not sure on others.