Lost my Mavic in Buffalo, NY while in Sport mode

eogra7 · May 13, 2017

About 5 minutes into my flight, my RC completely lost connection and went to a scrolling "connecting" on the screen. It was high up enough to clear any obstacles and so I waited about 10 minutes for the drone to come back home since it had a lot of battery left. When it didn't come home, my spotter and I drove to the last known location but did not see the drone in the sky or on the ground... Does anyone have any ideas of what could have happened?
Phantom Log Viewer - PhantomHelp.com

cderoche · May 13, 2017

After looking at your data and map, I'm not sure what happened to where you lost connection after going into fixed wing mode, that data stopped tracking right before that apartment or condo, and Lowes. I would assume it may have kept it's course and speed up until the battery died... At over 38mph in sport mode your battery would not last as long as going 20mph, depending on wind direction also. The Mavic is supposed to be able to fly up to 8 miles in ideal conditions and probably at 20mph. So I would deduct the near mile you already have flown, and showing 84% battery life left.... I would estimate it might have flown possibly 5 more miles, assuming it didn't hit anything at over 400ft up and didn't turn. Draw a straight line from your last data point and aim it where it would have gone from there, I'd search from the last data point all the way to at least 5 or 6 miles beyond it. That's a huge search area. Hope you have your name on it and phone number like me.
Check out this sample of where it may have ended up. If nothing else you could post photos in the area maybe with your info, and a small reward even.

Cyberpower678 · May 13, 2017

So one of the consequences of FWM, is that it continues flying when the remote disconnects, so I hear. It really acts like an RC place. So you experienced a flyaway. I'll see if I can give you a reasonable search area to go look for it.

EDIT: It looks like you exited FWM before the flight ended.

msinger · May 13, 2017

Cyberpower678 said:
So one of the consequences of FWM, is that it continues flying when the remote disconnects, so I hear.

Where are you hearing that?

Cyberpower678 · May 13, 2017

msinger said:
Where are you hearing that?

I heard it mentioned several times on different threads. Don't ask me to recall which ones.

cderoche · May 13, 2017

Cyberpower678 said:
So one of the consequences of FWM, is that it continues flying when the remote disconnects, so I hear. It really acts like an RC place. So you experienced a flyaway. I'll see if I can give you a reasonable search area to go look for it.

EDIT: It looks like you exited FWM before the flight ended.

That last point when I clicked on it, it didn't give a status, but I'd bet you're correct that it exited FWM.

Cyberpower678 · May 13, 2017

cderoche said:
That last point when I clicked on it, it didn't give a status, but I'd bet you're correct that it exited FWM.

I'm reading your stick inputs. Your craft exited FWM almost immediately.

Cyberpower678 · May 13, 2017

I'm not seeing any reason why the drone shouldn't have returned home. GPS was strong, your altitude was very high, too high actually, and the wind was calm. So my suspicion is that it may have landed.

My flight analysis experience tells me that a fallout could have happened from an insecure battery. Or it simply landed immediately.

CaveDrone · May 13, 2017

Cyberpower678 said:
I'm reading your stick inputs. Your craft exited FWM almost immediately.

Pardon me, but what is FWM?[emoji4]

Cyberpower678 · May 13, 2017

CaveDrone said:
Pardon me, but what is FWM?[emoji4]

Fixed Wing Mode

cderoche · May 13, 2017

Wish DJI would work on their app crashing bug / conflict with Android 7 instead adding new flight modes...

Cyberpower678 · May 13, 2017

eogra7 said:
About 5 minutes into my flight, my RC completely lost connection and went to a scrolling "connecting" on the screen. It was high up enough to clear any obstacles and so I waited about 10 minutes for the drone to come back home since it had a lot of battery left. When it didn't come home, my spotter and I drove to the last known location but did not see the drone in the sky or on the ground... Does anyone have any ideas of what could have happened?
Phantom Log Viewer - PhantomHelp.com

Unfortunate news. It looks like if it landed, it would be some where here. If it did drop out of the sky it may have landed on a car or roof.

My best bet, it ended up in the parking lot on the left.

CaveDrone · May 13, 2017

Thanks!

Cyberpower678 · May 13, 2017

cderoche said:
Wish DJI would work on their app crashing bug / conflict with Android 7 instead adding new flight modes...

This wasn't an app crash issue.

msinger · May 13, 2017

Cyberpower678 said:
I heard it mentioned several times on different threads. Don't ask me to recall which ones.

I doubt it's true. That would be a dangerous thing to program into that flight mode.

Cyberpower678 · May 13, 2017

msinger said:
I doubt it's true. That would be a dangerous thing to program into that flight mode.

Indeed.

msinger · May 13, 2017

Since there was still plenty of battery left, the Mavic was high enough to clear all obstacles, it wasn't windy, and it didn't return home, I'm assuming it landed at its current location after it came to a stop. Look for it in this area:

Cyberpower678 · May 13, 2017

msinger said:
Since there was still plenty of battery left, the Mavic was high enough to clear all obstacles, it wasn't windy, and it didn't return home, I'm assuming it landed at its current location after it came to a stop. Look for it in this area:

View attachment 12774

It's nice when two users have the same conclusion.