DJI Mavic, Air and Mini Drones
Friendly, Helpful & Knowledgeable Community
Join Us Now

Just Crashed my Mavic 3 Into the Ocean

Will It Fly Again?


  • Total voters
    21

Noah Hollins

Member
Joined
Jun 3, 2017
Messages
6
Reactions
2
Age
22
I have been a member of this forum for some time but have yet to post anything or report any incidents. I've owned my Mavic 3 for some time now and had no crashes. I was out over the water at a sandbar filming some people in the water (you can see me with the handheld camera in the water.) My brother was the one flying the drone, (pictured on the boat on the right) we are a team of 3 videographers, our other videographer uses different control method which caused my brother to get disoriented, panic and fly my drone into the outriggers (which were not in use) of a fishing boat a couple feet away (seen on the left). The drone was submerged for less than 10 seconds and we quickly pulled it out of the water and dried it off. Its currently sitting in rice and praying that I dont have to fork over 1000$ / 2000$ for a new drone as I do not have DJI Care on this one.

I was able to recover all the footage apart from the clip that was recording at the time of the crash.

Attached is a screenshot of a video taken 5 minutes prior.

Any thoughts?


Screenshot 2025-01-11 185616.png
 
Sorry for the drone loss. Hope the rice does the trick, but I'm guessing you'll be forking over for a new drone if I had to wager a bet.

I guess I would have used a control scheme that your brother is comfortable flying, especially being around other people and objects that can be harmed. That would be my first procedural change. A panicked pilot is a dangerous pilot.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Rchawks
A different control method?

Saltwater + electronics never mix.
DJI offers 3 different control methods on the DJI Fly app. MODE 1 / MODE 2 / MODE 3

for example the left stick makes the drone go up and down and the right stick back and forth.

this is the method default by DJI and what we use. Mode 1 reverses this, which is what confused the pilot.

So he tried to turn the drone away from the boat and ended up going right into it.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Rchawks and mavictk
and dried it off
MISTAKE. If it had a chance, Sorry you should have taken it out of the salt water and immediately placed it in a bath of clean water (no salt) then total disassembly into an alcohol bath With Salt water every min counts BUT Good luck you may have a slight chance,
Mode 1 reverses this, which is what confused the pilot.
SO.....No Pre-Flight?
 
The drone was submerged for less than 10 seconds and we quickly pulled it out of the water and dried it off. Its currently sitting in rice and praying that I dont have to fork over 1000$ / 2000$ for a new drone as I do not have DJI Care on this one.
The effectiveness of rice is a myth.
It's not going to help you.
As explained above, you would have had to rinsed the salt out and then used alcohol.
But the damage has already been done and the salt is now spreading in the drone's circuitry, damaging everything it contacts.
 
The effectiveness of rice is a myth.
It's not going to help you.
As explained above, you would have had to rinsed the salt out and then used alcohol.
But the damage has already been done and the salt is now spreading in the drone's circuitry, damaging everything it contacts.
It only happened a few hours ago. do you think fresh water is still good or too late? along with alcohol?
 
Saltwater is highly corrosive. Plain water isn't nearly as corrosive.

Pure water is not a conductor of electricity. It's the impurities in the water that makes it conductive.
Salt water is a decent conductor.

The more salt, the more conductive.

The #1 goal would be to remove any trace of salt. Taking it apart and rinsing it as good as possible with distilled water is your best bet. Then, as suggested, rinse the water out with alcohol. NOT the cheap rubbing alcohol. There's a 90%+ version available. Us that if you can't get hold of any 99% pure.
You could try everclear drinking alcohol but that's not much better than the 90% stuff.

DO NOT LET THE SALT DRY OUT IN THE DRONE. That's the worst thing for it right now.

Once you have everything rinsed out as good as you can, put it in a box with desiccant (NOT IN THE DESSICANT) in a warm place.
Rice is a desiccant in a pinch but so is kitty litter.

I don't know what you'd do to "lube" the motors but whatever oils that are in them will be gone with the alcohol.
 
Well, there's an easy way to distill the 70% to much higher.
Funny thing, though, it involves (NON IODIZED) salt.

Salt doesn't dissolve in alcohol but it attaches to water.
You could put a teaspoon of salt in a bottle of rubbing alcohol and shake it up real good. Wait for it to separate and the salt water will be the lower 30% and the alcohol will be the upper 70%.

Or go to a pharmacy and get the 90% stuff.
(or go to a print shop and ask them for 99%)

I can't believe, after the covid pandemic, there are people who don't have this stuff under their sink.


1736645367480.jpeg

1736645387010.jpeg
 
As said above really you will have to be VERY lucky to get it working after the salt water bath BUT its worth the chance to try.
 
hi, sorry for you lost. (For the record, I do not have experience nor expertise in handling drones soaked with sea water, below are just educated guess only)

Sitting with rice is not the best course of action.


In this aspect, I think iPhone and Mavic 3 are the same.

Bathing the drone in clean water/alcohol doesn't sounds right too. With my limited experience in flying in rain, the camera lens of Mavic 3 seems to have some resistance to water. Salt water may not get into the lens if the immersion period is short. Yet, the subsequent bath may kill it instead.

If my drone fall into the sea and I was able to recovery it shortly afterward, I would do the following:

1. immediately remove the battery
2. remove any sea water (shaking, dry towel etc) as soon as possible to minimize any damage
3. rinse (not bathing) affected parts with clean water to wash away the salt water. Avoid the unaffected area (e.g. lens) as far as possible. Do it part by part as far as possible. Motor are my least concern, they seems to be quite weather resistant. open the cast if you can to make sure everything is clean from salt water (doing so, however, will make sure your drone no longer cover by DJI care.)
4. Dry everything completely: with fan, air conditioner, dehumidifier etc.....
5. After everything is done, take reference to the sun, moon, jupiter position, do a tarot card and pray for 1 hour to divinate your most lucky hours before putting a fresh battery to test flight the drone, hoping that it would fly again...
 
  • Like
  • Haha
Reactions: RodPad and Beet
The same applies to the battery.... but given that the battery are not sealed and there are many spacing inside, it is unlikely that you can completely clear the salt water inside. It may go wrong anytime. Best if you don't use it again.

Use distilled water for the rinse and dispose the battery responsibly.
funny that the way to responsibly dispose the battery (as suggested in some drone training material) are to immerse it in salt water. I suppose this would "short circuit" the battery to release all the chemical energy and at the same time cold the battery down.
 
  • Like
Reactions: RodPad
I have been a member of this forum for some time but have yet to post anything or report any incidents. I've owned my Mavic 3 for some time now and had no crashes. I was out over the water at a sandbar filming some people in the water (you can see me with the handheld camera in the water.) My brother was the one flying the drone, (pictured on the boat on the right) we are a team of 3 videographers, our other videographer uses different control method which caused my brother to get disoriented, panic and fly my drone into the outriggers (which were not in use) of a fishing boat a couple feet away (seen on the left). The drone was submerged for less than 10 seconds and we quickly pulled it out of the water and dried it off. Its currently sitting in rice and praying that I dont have to fork over 1000$ / 2000$ for a new drone as I do not have DJI Care on this one.

I was able to recover all the footage apart from the clip that was recording at the time of the crash.

Attached is a screenshot of a video taken 5 minutes prior.

Any thoughts?


View attachment 180545
My tip to myself and to others is "stay high man" especially over water go up to 120 m immediately and zoom in on what you want .
If something goes wrong you have time to hit the pause button applies to my fpv drone too trying flips and rolls the higher the better as we have more time to bail

unless I was say flying the avata round the garden and through the house and trees we I can easily find it...saludos from Spain
Drones can also be waterproofed especially fpv home built ones
 
The effectiveness of rice is a myth...
I have successfully used the "rice". Years ago I had an HTC phone that went through all the cycles of a clothes washing machine. (not salt water) I was going to toss it, but wife suggested the rice, so I threw it in a ziplok with minute rice (it was all that we had). At the time I had an extra phone that I was able to reactivate, so I started using that and left the HTC in the rice for 3-4 weeks. I was pleasantly surprised that the phone worked 100%, and I went back to using it. It may have worked anyway, without the rice?? I don't know...difficult to prove a counterfactual.
 
Costly error. A possible solution might be to label the controller indicating which stick mode it uses.
 
You need to remove the battery and rinse the salt water out of it immediately with distilled water. Then set it somewhere with a fan blowing through it for several days. Put a new battery in it and cross your fingers.
 
So you want to fill your bathtub with water, Twist the drone under water back and fourth about 100 times , than let it dry, most likely your going to get the ESC errors as well as the Sensor Errors and need a new main board.

We recommend flying the Mavic 3 with a Rescue Jacket for a pre flight in new areas over the water.
To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.


To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.

Phantomrain.org
Gear to fly in the Rain
 
Last edited:

DJI Drone Deals

New Threads

Forum statistics

Threads
135,773
Messages
1,609,852
Members
164,234
Latest member
tecc281287
Want to Remove this Ad? Simply login or create a free account