This was my first mission experience using Litchi to fly my MP1 and run a 2.2 mile GPS mapping course to identify our property corners in a heavily forested district with steep ravines. Thanks to forum members sea157 and bdog I had the mission planned and plotted in Google Earth Pro. I planned the mission using an AGL value of 150' which should have cleared the tallest trees, but I was soon to learn that AGL would prove to be a bad choice due to the steep cliffs that I would encounter and inability of the bird to negotiate such a major change of AGL in the course. This was the planned mission:
But 4.22 minutes into the flight my controller screen read "aircraft disconnected". Reviewing the video playback verified that I had hit a tree 65' up and flying sideways at 22 mph. I had programmed the flight to keep the camera pointed north. Each waypoint was a GPS corner of the property. The last waypoint before the crash was valid, so I used my iPad with the mission overlay and the pad's GPS to search for two days in thick brush and manzanita without success despite verifying the GPS location of the last waypoint (a very large pine tree). It was on the third day of searching when I realized that I was starting about 100 yards too far south in heading for the large tree.
Again using the iPad GPS I walked up our road until the iPad verified that I was now directly on the flight path, so the bird had to be about 300' down the hill. Sure enough, there was the MP1 sitting right side up at the base of another large pine and looking like I had landed it there on purpose. Other than some small cracks in my Master Airscrew props I found no damage and the bird ready to fly again after a preemptive recalibration of the IMU and sensors.
Though the video recorded on the bird's SD card showed the takeoff, flight, and collision I couldn't figure out how to get any flight data off of the SD card in the bird or my iPad until I later remembered Airdata. Though I had downloaded the free version a couple of months ago I hadn't tried using it until now. So when I loaded it, much to my surprise I saw every mission I flew for the past two months. Magic! And sure enough, when I clicked on the mission flown the day of the crash THERE was the exact flight path, waypoint information, and exact Google Earth location of the tree where I found the bird. And the flight path even showed the spiraling of the Mavic as it crashed through the branches on its way 65' down to Mother Earth. Here is a screen shot of the Airdata screen:
I have seen many posts where some of the more experienced and knowledgeable pilots refer to Airdata as a recovery/discovery tool, but this was my first use of it and it would have been a terrific aid when I first went to recover my lost bird. Since Airdata is not an app but is a web site, I assume that once you set up an account it finds and downloads your flight logs from Go4 as well as Litchi. I didn't have cell connection to my iPad at the time so my thought is that it would not work until I got within cell tower range.
Any comments or tips are welcome. And the flight video is a thrill ride as at one point half way through the 4:22 minutes when the bird flies THROUGH a tree branch without so much as a hiccup.
But 4.22 minutes into the flight my controller screen read "aircraft disconnected". Reviewing the video playback verified that I had hit a tree 65' up and flying sideways at 22 mph. I had programmed the flight to keep the camera pointed north. Each waypoint was a GPS corner of the property. The last waypoint before the crash was valid, so I used my iPad with the mission overlay and the pad's GPS to search for two days in thick brush and manzanita without success despite verifying the GPS location of the last waypoint (a very large pine tree). It was on the third day of searching when I realized that I was starting about 100 yards too far south in heading for the large tree.
Again using the iPad GPS I walked up our road until the iPad verified that I was now directly on the flight path, so the bird had to be about 300' down the hill. Sure enough, there was the MP1 sitting right side up at the base of another large pine and looking like I had landed it there on purpose. Other than some small cracks in my Master Airscrew props I found no damage and the bird ready to fly again after a preemptive recalibration of the IMU and sensors.
Though the video recorded on the bird's SD card showed the takeoff, flight, and collision I couldn't figure out how to get any flight data off of the SD card in the bird or my iPad until I later remembered Airdata. Though I had downloaded the free version a couple of months ago I hadn't tried using it until now. So when I loaded it, much to my surprise I saw every mission I flew for the past two months. Magic! And sure enough, when I clicked on the mission flown the day of the crash THERE was the exact flight path, waypoint information, and exact Google Earth location of the tree where I found the bird. And the flight path even showed the spiraling of the Mavic as it crashed through the branches on its way 65' down to Mother Earth. Here is a screen shot of the Airdata screen:
I have seen many posts where some of the more experienced and knowledgeable pilots refer to Airdata as a recovery/discovery tool, but this was my first use of it and it would have been a terrific aid when I first went to recover my lost bird. Since Airdata is not an app but is a web site, I assume that once you set up an account it finds and downloads your flight logs from Go4 as well as Litchi. I didn't have cell connection to my iPad at the time so my thought is that it would not work until I got within cell tower range.
Any comments or tips are welcome. And the flight video is a thrill ride as at one point half way through the 4:22 minutes when the bird flies THROUGH a tree branch without so much as a hiccup.
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